This indicator measures the number of reported incidents of child recruitment perpetrated by armed forces or armed groups (including government and/or opposition groups) at schools, universities or other educational facilities, or on the way to or from them, in the last 12 months or during a designated period of time.
Virtual library of the Office of the Special Representative of the Secretary General for Children and Armed Conflict, OCHA’s Humanitarian Data Exchange’s Education and Conflict Monitor, the reports of the Global Coalition to Protect Education from Attack (GCPEA), and GCPEA and Insecurity Insight’s Education in Danger newsbrief.
Article 1 (A), Article 2 (1), Article 13 (1,4), International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights; Article 29 (2), Convention on the Rights of the Child; Article 2, Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on the involvement of children in armed conflict; Articles 4, 13, 32, 50 & 94, Geneva Convention IV; Article 48, 49, 50, 51, 57, 58, 77 & 78, Additional Protocol I to the Geneva Conventions; Art 4 (2, 3° Additional Protocol II to the Geneva Conventions; International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance; Article 2 (2) Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment; Article 1 (A), Article 2 (1), International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights; Article 7, (g) (i) & article 8 (2) (b) (ix), Rome Statute;; Article 13 (5), Protocol of San Salvador; Article 11 (7), African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child; Article 14 (3), European Union Charter of Fundamental Rights; Article 27 (3) ILO Convention 169; Article 18, Council of Europe Convention on the Protection of Children against Sexual Exploitation and Sexual Abuse. UN Security Council resolutions: 1261 (1999), 1314 (2000), 1379 (2001), 1460 (2003), 1539 (2004), 1612 (2005), 1820 (2008), 1882 (2009), 1998 (2011), 2068 (2012), 2143 (2014), 2225 (2015), 2427 (2018).
Add up all the reported incidents identified and qualified as child recruitment in the indicator Have students, teachers and other educational personnel been attacked at or on the way to or coming back from schools, universities or other educational facilities? (Disaggregation level IIF).
‘Child recruitment at, or on the way to or from, school occurs when armed forces or armed groups recruit children under the age of 18 from their schools or along school routes. Recruitment for any purpose is included, as for example, for serving as fighters, spies, or intelligence sources; for domestic work; or to transport weapons or other materials’ (GCPEA, Education Under Attack 2020 Report, p. 87). The Convention on the Rights of the Child sets fifteen years as the minimum age for military recruitment and for taking direct part in hostilities. The 2000 Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on the involvement of children in armed conflict, drafted in order to raise the minimum ages set out in the Convention, sets the higher age of eighteen years as the minimum for recruitment or participation in armed conflict. Children who are soldiers usually do not enjoy the right to education and are prevented from going to school. Note that for the Global Coalition to Protect Education from Attack (GCPEA), child recruitment constitutes a distinct category. We consider it a sub-category of attacks on students, teachers and other educational personnel and therefore, included in this category.
The indicator can be applied at a regional, national or subnational level.