ANDI (News Agency for Children's Rights)

ANDI pressures national and international media to address issues around youth and children and the violence that they suffer. Before the agency came into existence, Brasil had suffered from a paucity of quality news about children; today this has changed dramatically. Journalism no longer addresses children in assistencialista terms, sees the importance of their rights, and does not consider kids to be only the objects of pity and charity.

ANDI uses 12 interlocking strategies toward this end:

1. The daily clipping service “Children in the media.” 3000 emails go out each day with a report of every story about children in the major media outlets. Each week, the most important stories are translated into English and sent to an additional 1500 subscribers.
   
2. Clipping analysis. ANDI examines reports by region and works with local NGOs and the local press to find solutions to local problems.
   
3. Clippings for kids. This service is similar, but directed to children, parents, and teachers. It also includes TV and radio reports.
   
4. Training. ANDI works with journalists to give them a foundation on the issues most important to children. This includes deconstructing the assistencialista/ charity mentality and replacing it with a rights-based attitude.
   
5. Journalista “amigo de criança.” Each year, ANDI selects 25-30 national journalists that it believes have most effectively presented children’s issues and invites them to an awards ceremony in Brasilia. They have found this prize to promote work in favor of kids and to support journalists inside papers that might have been previously less sympathetic.
   
6. Regional seminars. ANDI organizes local seminars and press conferences where journalists can talk to important figures (including the president) about only children.
   
7. Research. ANDI analizes the behavior of the media, examining when and why reports about children explode, what ANDI’s influences have been, and how media reports help and hurt NGOs and kids.
   
8. Counseling. ANDI is always a resource for individual journalists doing stories on kids.
   
9. Special reports.
   
10. Training on education. ANDI teaches journalists about how education functions in Brasil (many journalists went to private school and do not understand the public system attended by most children). This project has become a model for all of Ibero-America; Gabriel García Márquez’s foundation is now involved, and ANDI will present their work at the 6th Ibero-American summit.
    
11. Rede ANDI. A network of journalists working for children’s rights. It attempts to include smaller outlets as well as large, national media.
    
12. Radio for children. ANDI is now expanding its work into radio.

SDS Ed. Boulevard Center, Bloco A, Sala 101
Brasilia, DF; 70391-900

tel: 61 322 6508 fax 61 322 4973

Contact: Marcus Fuchs (mfuchs@andi.org.br or andi@andi.org.br)
Director: Geraldinho Vieira

www.andi.org.br