Special projects

Through our work, we know that children and young people have a lot to say about many different issues. These can be issues affecting them, their families and communities, other children and young people or other things about their lives. Sometimes we do special projects to hear the experiences and views of young people living in very particular and often quite difficult circumstances.

They include young people in the care of the State. Three groups of young people are the focus of recent OCO special projects,

Through these and other special projects, we hope to learn from young people about their lives and highlight their concerns to people who make decisions about children and young people so that things can change. One of our biggest projects to date was the Big Ballot when we heard from almost 75,000 children and young people between 4 and 17 years old in Ireland. Children and young people voted on the issues that were most important to them. While the issue which children and young people identified as being of most concern was Family and Care the OCO has committed to working on all of the issues that were voted on over the coming years.