International Day for Street Children – April 2025

Happy International Day for Street Children! 🎉

Every year, this special day acknowledges the strength and resilience of millions of street connected children around the world.

The theme this year is ‘participation‘, emphasising the value and importance of enabling street connected children to participate in decision-making processes concerning issues that impact their lives. Events will be taking place across the globe to mark this day and encourage governments, organisations and individuals to work together to ensure that the rights of street connected children are protected, and that they have access to the same services, care, and protection as all other children.

At S.A.L.V.E. International, we acknowledge this important day every year with the publishing our of ‘News from the Street’ newspaper, put together entirely from content produced by young people we support across our programmes. It is a chance for the voices of street connected children to be amplified, and I encourage you to read this edition, which is full of thoughts, reflections, poetry and artwork that focus on the importance of children’s participation.

You can read it in English or Luganda by clicking on the images below.

The Importance of Participation

In collating the 2025 edition of ‘News from the Streets’, a quote from Anna* stood out to me:

‘Participation in decision making is very vital in our lives.

It is because what we are today is largely as a result of the decisions we took in the past. In the same way, whatever happens tomorrow will be a result of the decisions we take in the present’

In a particularly challenging fundraising climate that is having a considerable impact across the globe, it is more important than ever that young people are brought around the table when strategies for development are being designed. The decisions that are made today – whether about education, climate change, economies or employment – will have a huge impact on the next generation. Not listening to their voices and not recognising their ideas, solutions and ambitions in our planning, would mean we have failed them.

At S.A.L.V.E. International, we are proud of how involved young people are in our strategic decision-making. Our Children’s Council meets three times a year, with representation from all areas of our programming, to discuss the ways we are working, what we can do better and what young people want us to focus on. Our weekly Halfway Home meetings ensure we can address challenges raised by the children staying with us, and implement their great ideas quickly. Children’s voices are at the centre of everything that we do.

Help to Support Our Work

As we mark the International Day for Street Children, we’re reminded just how vital, and urgent, our work is. Every day, we are seeing more children relying on the street for survival, and the demand for our support continues to grow.

We are reaching and rehabilitating hundreds of children each year, reuniting them with their families to ensure that they are not living or working on the street. But there is more that we can do, and we can’t do it without you.

Your support makes it possible for us to provide life-saving services to children, but we are also focused on building capacity within communities, to address the root causes of poverty, and help families build sustainable futures.

As the need for our work grows, so must our ability to respond.

This International Day for Street Children, please consider making a donation to support our work. You can make one-off or regular gifts via our website.

👉 salveinternational.org/donate

Together, we can make sure there is ‘No Street Called Home’.

Webale nyo

Your support is so important to us, particularly on International Day for Street Children. Thank you for believing in our vision for young people on the streets, and for advocating for us and the children that we work with. We can only make a difference with your support.

With optimism and thanks,

Lucas and the whole S.A.L.V.E. team