[hr-education] Re: List of competence criteria for trainers in the field of human rights

Karolina,

There are a number of documents that you can refer to in regards to the
topic of facilitator competencies. You can access the following documents
on-line (if the URLs are incorrect, the documents can all be found in
HREA's on-line Library - {http://www.hrea.org/erc/Library/ } ):

HRE Pack, developed by the ARRC
{http://www.arrc-hre.com/publications/hrepack1/hrepack_frameset.html })

Human Rights Here and Now, developed by the University of Minnesota’s
Human Rights Center
{http://www1.umn.edu/humanrts/edumat/hreduseries/hereandnow/Default.htm })

COMPASS: A Manual on Human Rights Education with Young People, developed
by the Directorate of Youth and Sport of the Council of Europe
{http://www.hrea.org/erc/Library/display.php?doc_id=1468&category_id=18&category_type=3
})

Human Rights Training: A Manual on Human Rights Training Methodology,
developed by Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights
{http://www.hrea.org/erc/Library/display.php?doc_id=223&category_id=21&category_type=3&group
}=)

While references such as these are excellent in sharing experiences and
guidelines with people who are interested in learning about facilitation,
I believe it's important to be a critical consumer of such resources. As
part of some on-going research that I am conducting, I've been exploring
facilitator competencies through interviewing a number of HRE
facilitators. Since 2004, I’ve had the opportunity to interview a sample
of beginning and experienced HRE facilitators from North America, Eastern
Europe, Western/Eastern Africa, and South/South-East Asia.

During these interviews, one question that I asked was "How does one go
about learning to facilitate, i.e., if someone asked you for advice on how
to learn to be a facilitator, what would you say?" Responses could be
broadly identified as belonging to two categories: (a) skills, and (b)
attitudes. The first category referred to engaging in specific activities
to develop appropriate skills, such as learning from mentors, practice,
chairing meetings, and public speaking. The second category, referred to
attitudes that were seen to be congruent with facilitation, such as being
open to learning from participants, being open to receiving criticism,
engaging in self-criticism, being reflective, and having a commitment to
continual learning about facilitation.

I also asked "How does personality affect facilitation?", and all
facilitators agreed that it was critical to their work. Facilitators
mentioned a number of characteristics that were supportive of
facilitation: Being self-aware, open, encouraging, empathic, trusting in
people, easygoing, calm, non-judgmental, approachable, humourous,
energetic, comfortable in front of group, present in the task; believing
in human dignity, in people to understand one another; having presence,
charisma, integrity; validating participants (making them feel important);
willing and ready to listen, to learn, embrace continual learning.

Based on this preliminary work, it seems that facilitation is both
skills-dependent, as well as attitude-dependent. My current thinking,
though, is that the latter will be more important to successful
facilitation, and as one facilitator stated, may prove that "character and
personality shapes 80% of the role of facilitator"! If this theory is
viable, then lists of facilitator competencies may eventually be less
focused on technical competencies, and more focused on attitudinal
elements. Based on this, training sessions would be developed with a heavy
emphasis on self-reflection of personal and professional attitudes as a
necessary component of professional development.

It would be a pleasure to hear the thoughts of interested listserv
colleagues, and to continue this dialogue!

Kevin

-- 
Kevin Chin
Canada-U.S. Fulbright Fellow 2005-2006
Ph.D. Candidate, Department of Educational and Counselling Psychology
Faculty of Education, McGill University 3700 McTavish, Montréal,
Québec, H3A 1Y2
E-mail: <   >



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