A Heart for Working Children: Oakseed launches youth blogsite and essay contest on International Child Labor

VIENNA, Va. – Oakseed Ministries International today announced an international essay contest for youth on the topic: Compassion and the Working Child. Last year’s essay contest garnered approximately 1,100 essays from around the world.

Oakseed is also hosting a blogsite for youth that is designed to help young people to think critically about the issue of international child labor. The blogsite will feature insights from child labor experts as well as links to other sites featuring information on the working child. This blogsite also features winning essays from the 2006 international essay contest. The Oakseed blogsite address is: www.essayblog.oakseed.org

Essay Contest: Compassion and the Working Child
Essay Sponsor: Oakseed Ministries International, www.oakseed.org
Essay Website: www.essayblog.oakseed.org
Age Categories: ages 12 and under, ages 13 – 17 and ages 18 – 22
Deadline: April 16, 2007
Prizes: (In each category) First place - $1,000, Second place - $500, Honorable mention - $250.
Essay Guidelines: Detailed guidelines available at www.oakseed.org or by request by emailing essay@oakseed.org or calling (toll free) 877-876-9020.

“It is tragic to know that in our world today that millions are involved in child labor,” said Ed Bradley, president of Oakseed ministries. “By hosting the Compassion and the Working Child essay contest Oakseed Ministries hopes to empower children here in the U.S. and abroad to think critically about the worldwide problem of child labor. We can all learn by listening to the insights that young people bring to the issue of compassion for working children.”

A 2006 global report by the International Labor Organization (ILO), www.ilo.org, stated: “In 2004 there were 218 million children trapped in child labor, of whom 126 million were in hazardous work.” The report stated that in total there were “317 million economically active children aged 5 – 17 in 2004, of whom 218 million could be considered as child laborers.” According to the ILO, in 2004, 166 million child laborers were between the ages of 5 and 14.

Submitted essays should not be a clinical assessment of child labor, but instead a personal response to the crisis of the working child worldwide. The essay is a part of a yearlong effort to raise awareness of the plight of working children that will culminate in the Annual Day of Prayer for Children at High Risk on Sunday, June 3, 2007.

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Oakseed Ministries International is a faith-based non-profit organization that seeks to respond to God’s heart by defending the cause of the poor, the fatherless and society’s castoffs in the megacities of the developing world. Oakseed assists ministries that serve abandoned children and the poor.