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CONTENT |  The Glasgow ReAct: Stewart Asquith, Anne Kielland, Irene Rizzini, Tom Hanna and Daniel Baudin |
In September 1994 representatives from 15 leading child research institutions from all over the world met at Ranten, Norway. The purpose of the meeting was to discuss modalities for closer cooperation under the Childwatch umbrella. Among the main conclusions from the meeting were the needs for improved exchange of information, mapping of existing capacities, and the establishment of a database on child research.
In order to address these needs, a task force of 6 individuals, who had indicated interest in these issues and/or have relevant experience, came together in Glasgow April 28 - 30, 1995. (Please refer to Annex for full participants list.)
The specific objectives of the meeting were:
Childwatch demonstrated its www prototype (http://www.oslonett.no/ Childwatch/index.html). A major feature of the home page is currently the results of a European Survey on child rights related research and information collections.
The European Survey is the result of cooperation with the International Child Rights Information Network, UNICEF and UNESCO. A questionnaire was sent to about 700 institutions in Europe asking them to report if they were involved in research relating to children's rights or if they had information collections. Slightly less than 240 responses came back, which is considered a very good turnout. After the data collection, the data was computed and analysed with the UNESCO developed software MicroIsis. In cooperation with the IT department of the University of Oslo and Oslonett a presentation in the WorldWideWeb format for Internet has been developed.
Tom Hanna introduced the meeting to the National Data Archive on Child Abuse and Neglect. The Archive's mission is to facilitate the secondary analysis of high quality data sets relevant to the study of child abuse and neglect. The primary activity of the Archive is the acquisition, preservation and dissemination of these data sets.
The Family Life Development Center has invested in developing a home page that contains references to relevant data bases, electronic conferences, other relevant information sources in addition to its own material.
Daniel Boudin presented the BIRD CD-Rom produced by the International Children's Centre in Paris. It contains a broad collection of references related to Children and their environment. The BIRD CD-Rom represents an efficient way of visualizing the references one must be looking for. One can then consult all index sources on-site, or order the excerpts needed. The CD-Rom is updated annually.
4.1.1. The Survey outline
It was an important objective to the Task Force to specify what information a
database on child research should contain. What information is requested by
researchers around the world? How can a data base make different types of
information available in an efficient way? There are three general approaches, to
focus on:
However, by collecting a basic set of data including information on all three items, useful information becomes available and could be sorted depending on what is the primary interest for the user. Such a database could furthermore provide the user with the necessary information to get in contact with institutions and researchers with project related competence.
A preliminary baseline format for the planned world wide survey for the database was agreed to be:
Daniel Baudin of the ICC will develop a first draft for the survey questionnaire.
4.1.2. Strategy for the gathering of information
The distribution of the survey and the collection of information could probably
be done most effectively throug cooperation with regional partners. Stewart
Asquith will conduct a mapping of the outreach potential of the Key Institutions.
The Childwatch Key Institutions will be central in this process. In areas beyond their reach, we will need to identify other partners, such as local research organisations, UNICEF, major NGOs and others with the assistance of the Key Institutions. Members of the task force also have relevant contacts in various regions: Stewart Asquith has several contacts in Eastern Europe, Tom Hanna in the Middle East, Irene Rizzini in Latin America and Daniel Boudin in Africa.
4.1.3. Mode of gathering data
Data will be gathered in three different ways. Institutions that are on-line will
be encouraged to register their information directly on the net. A diskette form
of the survey will be sent to institutions using computers, but that are not on-
line. This might also be the mode of data collection by Key Institutions from
their networks. Finally a hard copy version will be made for institutions without
access to computers.
4.1.4. Further development of data base format
CWI is cooperating with the University of Oslo to develop world wide webb pages
further to contain references to all relevant information concerning child
research and to serve as a tool for researchers and those interested in the
results of child research. It is CWI's proposal to use the format developed
through this process for a global survey of child research, and to place the
questionnaire on the Internet through www for direct registration in the data
base. As a partner of the University of Oslo, CWI can take advantage of the
expertise in this field that the University represents and make use of state of
the art technology in the further development of the interactive survey on the
Internet. By placing the questionnaire on the web, the data base will be most
effectively updated, and each responding institution could be given a ''key'' to
update its entries.
4.1.5. Workplan
The Ranten Meeting's request for a database on databases is intended to be met by making a meta data base an integrated part of the general survey. In this manner the Child Research Data Base will have an additional function as a provider of information on existing databases.
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