Welcome to the Valuing Children Initiative #
Established 2016, the Valuing Children Initiative (VCI) emerged from a shared passion for advocating children's rights and needs. Since the start, our initiative has been dedicated to advancing community awareness about the importance of valuing children throughout Australia.
Through research, advocacy, promoting children's agency, and engaging with the community, we aim to educate society about the needs of children, present current statistics, and propose solutions for valuing children.
VCI is a project of the not-for-profit organisation, Centrecare.
Read the VCI Foundation Paper
We champion children's rights in an adult-centric world. #
Our mission is to ensure that all children are treated with dignity and respect.
Many of the systems designed for children, actually don’t work for children and can do them more harm than good. Children have no choice about the circumstances of their birth, or their childhood.
We believe that children and young people are essential members of society, deserving of love, protection, and respect. We understand that the experiences of childhood profoundly shape adulthood, making it imperative to create a nurturing and supportive environment for all children.
We highlight issues, attitudes and policies that impact children, to drive cultural and attitudinal change so that the prioritisation of children becomes automatic.
Our Journey Towards Change #
The Valuing Children Initiative project exists as we in Australia unfortunately record high instances of child poverty, child abuse, youth suicide, mental illness plus concerns for child safety, online safety, and ability to thrive in their education and health.
Australia has the capacity to ensure that all children are given the supports and opportunities they need to flourish. We believe that greater attention needs to be paid to societal attitudes towards children as these societal attitudes drive change and expectations about what is acceptable. Focusing on attitudes in the context of child wellbeing is essential. Identifying and addressing the systemic and attitudinal barriers that prevent children from reaching their potential is key.
Over the years, we have diligently worked to identify and address systemic and attitudinal barriers that hinder children from reaching their full potential. As a result, the VCI has positivity impacted children through contribution to policy, framework, strategy, inquiries that have directly changed services for children in Australia.
See What We Do
