Opened in 2011, the Estrutural Olympic and Paralympic Centre offers members of this impoverished and vulnerable community built around a landfill on the outskirts of Brasilia a safe and healthy space. With UNODC's own programme using sports to help prevent youth from becoming involved in crime and drugs now underway, we visited this centre to speak some of the people there and hear their story:
Tatiana, a mother of two who says that sports offers a safe space away from street violence; Ana Julia, 11, who has seen improvements in her health since coming to a sports centre; Guilherme, 13, who goes to the centre almost every day after school and says that his studies have improved; and Romualdo, a teaching and learning manager at the Estrutural Olympic and Paralympic Centre, who says that sport is essential in building citizenship and learning key values in life.
In mid-March, Ecuador's Council for Public Participation and Social Control ( Consejo de Participación Ciudadana y Control Social - CPCCS), in collaboration with UNODC, organized a series of anti-corruption capacity-building events in Quito. These included two academic seminars for professors and students as well as a seminar for private sector actors. During all three, UNODC presented the Education for Justice (E4J) initiative, emphasizing the forthcoming integrity and ethics university modules. The presentation was designed to introduce E4J and particularly its focus on integrity and ethics education, to encourage the formation of networks of integrity and ethics academics, and to highlight tools and materials that are available to ethics educators. All three seminar presentations were followed by an open discussion.
Herbert Gustavo Simões, 46, is a Professor at the Catholic University of Brasilia with postdoctoral research experience at University of Miami in the area of physical education and exercise physiology. He is also a keen sporting enthusiast, currently ranked as one of the world's fastest 110 metre hurdlists in his age bracket.
Herbert is one of two lead trainers working with UNODC in Brazil as part of the Doha Declaration Global Programme sports initiative which looks to build vital life skills among 13 - 18 year olds to keep them safe from violence, crime and drugs.
UNODC recently spoke with Herbert about his background and his interest in this area.
In using education to promote a culture of lawfulness, UNODC's 'Education for Justice' (E4J) initiative held its latest Expert Group Meeting from 7-8 March. Focussing on tertiary education - and following the hosting of primary and secondary-level educators and experts in February - the meeting brought together over 80 key academics from around the globe to draw on their expertise in teaching on crime prevention, criminal justice and the rule of law.
The meeting - held at the UN's offices in Vienna - generated a set of practical recommendations to support stronger teaching in the fields of corruption, organized crime, trafficking in persons, smuggling of migrants, terrorism, cybercrime, crime prevention and criminal justice and firearms trafficking, as well as on integrity and ethics.
This past week saw the start of phase two of UNODC's work in Brazil around using sports as a means to prevent crime, violence and drug use among youth.
Following the start of the Office's 'Line Up Live Up' curriculum in Brasilia, which will deliver life skills training in vulnerable communities, UNODC held a series of discussions with Government authorities, civil society and key sports organizations in Rio de Janeiro.
