We held a first working meeting with child members: Create, Plan, Participate. 36 children from around Europe between the ages of 10-17 came together in Brussels on June 27-28.
The objectives were to review the work done over the last two years (Work Plan 2023-2024) and discuss and propose topics for the next Work Plan (2025-2026).
The meeting was co-organised and co-facilitated by our amazing Children's Panel.
Many thanks to Aurora, Eyman, Gabriel, Gabrielius, Luisa, Maria, Naya, Tea, Yassmin and Zahira from the Panel. Plus a call out to Adrién who stepped in as part of the media team.
In addition to the work sessions, there was a photo booth, a website testing station, fun warm ups, team building and even some dancing!
What was done in 2023-2024
The children worked in groups to review the work done in the last two years. To say what has worked well and what could be improved.
- Activities: what activities and structures help children participate in government decisions, what Platform activities do children like, and what other activities they would like to see in the future
- Information: what children want to know about the EU and the Platform, what they think other children need to know, and the ways to communicate with children
- Groups: what groups are children working in, how they work together online, and what helps make the children in these groups feel included
- Making change: how children feel about the changes made from their input and how they prefer this to be communicated to them
Read the meeting report (English)
What to do in 2025-2026
Children continued working in groups to set out their hopes, dreams, and proposals for the future work of the Platform:
- Topics: brainstorming to collect all the topics which children feel are important to be covered by the Platform, including ideas from other Platform groups
- Inspiration: five adults from the European Commission came to exchange with the children on poverty and inclusion, well-being and education, safety online and cyber bullying, climate change, and funding
- Priorities: six main topics were proposed by the children, these were environment, war, education, poverty, social media, mental and physical health
- Making a pitch: each group presented the main points of their topic back to everyone
See the photos
Checking the agenda - ready to get started! 
A poster to say what's important on children's health 
The full team of our first working meeting! 
Communications workshop with Jose 
Iris from the European Commission talking about their work on children's rights 
Working to build the Platform that children want 
European Commission talks about the work they are doing for children 
Finding out what matters to our younger members 
Asking the important questions to Ingrid from the Commission 
Poster with our new visual identity 
Presenting their ideas on education 
Advocacy workshop with Lauren 
A discussion with Laura about children's rights 
Hearing what EU children have to say 
Making memories!
What's next?
- The Secretariat will write a report with the children's suggestions and proposed Work Plan topics
- The Commission will review this report to see which areas could have actions in EU policy-making in 2025-2026
- The Secretariat will draft the new Work Plan to be reviewed by the Children's Panel
- The new Work Plan will be reviewed and approved by the Advisory Board
- The Secretariat will report back to children in case any of their proposed topics were not included, and tell them why
We will then be ready to start two more years of work!