On Thursday August 17th, The Kids Council from TUI had a very special first day of school at Dr. Albert Schweitzer havo-vwo. Last year’s second graders that were a part of the Kids Council, received a medal and a certificate from TUI. Both were a part of the BUZZ award that the Kids Council won. Last June, TUI gave out these awards in the concert hall in Amsterdam. An estimate of 10.000 kids in The Netherlands and the Antilles voted on the Curaçao Kids Council.
Caroline Härtel, Manager External Affairs TUI Curaçao en Tamara Salsbach (TALENSA), Local representative of the Kids’ Council, took the awards to school. All the participants of TUI’s Kids’ Council in Curaçao received a medal and a certificate while the school also received a certificate for their part in the project.
First Kids Council outside The Netherlands
TUI is the first organization with a Kids Council outside The Netherlands. This is the reason for the jury of the Awards to nominate the travel organization. In 2015, TUI in collaboration with the Missing Chapter Foundation together with local tourism partners initiated the Kids Council on Curaçao. With this council represented by Albert Schweitzer College in Willemstad, the kids are informed about the developments in tourism in Curaçao. ‘We are extremely proud to be the first foreign Kids Council and that we received this beautiful award, says Arjan Kers, General Manager from TUI Netherlands. “We find it logical to involve children on issues that concern the future’. Children are the future. It is important for us to engage in conversations with them about how they see the development of holiday destinations. The choices we make today after all have an influence on the future generations”. Curaçao discovery trip for kids
One advice from the Kids Council was that there should be more activities for kids on Curaçao. TUI gave them the task to create a discovery trip on Curaçao for the kids. A discovery trip through the eyes of local children. In doing so, they had to take into account different conditions, should be suitable for local and visiting children, being used online and offline and that can it be educational and sustainable. From the ideas and insights from the kids, we formulated three concrete products: a chlidrenland card, a children’s app and a culture and history tour. At this moment, TUI employees are working hard on the making of the excursions through an app or a booklet. The content of the excursion is being filled with the insights given by the Kids Council. The first steps of the development of the excursion have been put in place.
Kids Council
The Kids Council aims to structurally involve children with companies and organizations about strategic and social issues. By learning together, everybody wins: the kids will learn to think about the world around them, decision makers can discover new and unexpected ways possibilities and new thinking ways, and teachers are inspired by the creative thinking of their students.CollaborationThe collaborations between TUI and the Kids Council goes back years. In 2013, TUI Nederland, the first Dutch travel organization, installed a Kids Council with a group of 15 students from the Leidschenveen Montessori School. To celebrate the 10th anniversary of TUI on Curaçao, the organization has set up the Kids Council in Curaçao in 2015.