Youth Challenge
Teaching human rights & responsibilities.
Unit 3: Young People in the Workplace
Introduction
The resources for this unit comprise the text and activities presented in this unit and the DVD Young people in the workplace. The two items should be used together to deliver this unit to students. The DVD shows a potential real-life situation of young people entering the workplace. An account of the DVD action, a 'script', is included as an alternative to the DVD, or as an additional resource for reference in discussions arising out of the study of this unit.
Case studies are provided which explore issues of sex discrimination, race discrimination and sexual harassment in the workplace. These issues are also raised in the DVD/script. The related activity sheets are designed to allow students to work through the human rights and responsibilities issues and to see how those issues are relevant to the workplace and to their daily lives.
Study of this unit gives students a greater understanding of how human rights need to be balanced with the responsibility of respecting the rights of others, and how to avoid the traps of labelling and stereotyping that can occur in our perceptions of others.
Human rights apply to every individual. To be aware of the rights you have as part of your inherent human dignity, you need to have a sense of your own humanity, and this is best gained through the development of a sense of identity. All people can have their concerns acknowledged in terms of human rights, at an individual level, or as a member of humankind, but there are times when the acknowledgement sought is about a different level of identity - do you see yourself as a person of a particular sex, of a particular family, cultural, social, language, racial or ethnic group? The determinations people make about their own identity can cause them to be part of a group that experiences human rights contraventions. Similarly, the groups others identify you with can have the same effect, regardless of how you may feel about being identified with that group. So how do we determine our own identity and respect the identity choices of others?
Rights are based in the values that societies live by. Concepts of justice and human dignity are at the heart of values systems. Rights may have been translated into law, or into coded practice of a given community group. In Australia, discrimination against people on the basis of race, sex, age or disability is against the law.
This unit of study provides an opportunity for students to explore their own sense of identity. It also draws the parallel between individual identification models and the need to respect the way others identify themselves. A variety of rights issues can be raised within the context of one situation, where the cultures and philosophies of the community, workplace or other group situation affect people's sense of identity and, in doing so, compromise the acknowledgement and respect of human rights. At work, issues of race, sex and disability discrimination may be encountered, and the rights and responsibilities of employees and employers may not be clearly defined. By exploring these issues and making students aware of the rights they should expect to uphold and have upheld in a workplace situation, they become empowered to act in situations where they see instances of unlawful discrimination in their own lives.