Alliance Ukraine’s advocacy school is a unique initiative in the region
24 September 2007
Alliance Ukraine’s advocacy leadership development programme – the annual Advocacy Summer School on HIV/AIDS – is becoming increasingly popular and attracting external funding thanks to its unique status in the region. The event’s organizer, Alliance Ukraine’s Pavlo Skala, explained that they were able to secure $15,000 in grants for the event from the Open Society Institute because “it remains a unique initiative for post-Soviet states east of the Ukrainian border.”
The advocacy school focuses on strengthening the capacity of human rights advocates to influence and change public policy – in a country with one of the most developed networks of HIV service organisations in Eastern Europe.
This year’s school brought together international experts, human rights advocates and other stakeholders from Georgia, Russia, Ukraine, and the United States to discuss a wide spectrum of issues. The school succeeded in helping form professional and personal ties between frontline workers and members of national and international non-governmental organisations.
By the end of the school, 24 non-governmental representatives from Ukraine and neighbouring states had received training in advocacy best practice and human rights protection for people living with HIV and other vulnerable populations. This was the second advocacy school to be organised by Alliance Ukraine in collaboration with the International Renaissance Foundation.
