A/HRC/51/54 23. During the discussion, Dr. Crear-Perry remarked that the expertise on addressing racism lay with the people affected by it and remarked on visible racial disparities in leadership roles that could perpetuate systemic racism. She noted the role of Governments and United Nations bodies in corporate accountability. The Chief of the Gender and Human Rights Branch of UNFPA emphasized the importance of dialogue to push those issues further and to explore win-win situations. Dr. Carter noted that it was necessary for organizations and institutions to develop policies specific to race, instead of generic anti-discrimination policies. Justin Hansford, a member of the Permanent Forum of People of African Descent, referred to community and collective efforts. 24. Introducing the second panel, on the theme “The imperative of multiple literacies for children of African descent to survive and thrive”, the Chair of the Working Group stated that the panel was intended to interrogate the reality of education as an enabling right for children of African descent. The Vice-Chair of the Working Group chaired the panel and delivered a presentation based on the Working Group’s recognition of education as an instrument of systemic discrimination and a potential vehicle for change that required frequent re-examination and recalibration. She elaborated upon the importance of language, multilingualism and literacy for children of African descent, emphasizing the need for multiple literacies. 25. Cream Wright, Head of Redi4Change, United States, provided a global overview of the situation of people of African descent, including the colonial experience and enslavement, which had an impact in the present-day lives of people of African descent. He spoke about migration, from the Windrush generation to the more recent migration from sub-Saharan Africa to Europe. He noted that, while emphasis was placed on native languages, borrowed language could offer greater advantages, and children in Africa routinely navigated multiple languages. In Africa, there was an effort to put more emphasis on functional literacy. He added that people of African descent needed to be more critical and selective about the knowledge they acquired from other cultures, using such knowledge to improve home-grown knowledge and the local culture. That was a new approach that established that children and people of African descent were co-inheritors of global knowledge. 26. Danielle Isler, a doctoral student from Switzerland, provided an account of how students of African descent in the diaspora were exposed to racial stereotypes, racial discrimination and racism throughout their education. The lack of representation of people of African descent in books and the lack of material on enslavement and colonialism and the history of Africa before enslavement and colonialism were pervasive. Being categorized as “other” was a defining experience for children of African descent growing up in Switzerland. She said that access to multiple literacies and greater access to people of African descent, and their contributions, was important for the identity, self-image and self-esteem of children of African descent. 27. Charo Mina Rojas, National Coordinator of Advocacy and Outreach for the Black Communities’ Process and member of the Afro-Colombian Solidarity Network, gave a presentation entitled “The right to Afrocentric education in Colombia to survive and thrive”. Ms. Rojas noted the distinction between surviving and thriving. In Colombia, State schools lacked various resources, affecting the quality of teachers, curricula, pedagogy and methodology, as well as overall education policy. That created a serious challenge for a cultural and ethnically diverse country. Children of African descent also faced structural racism and violence in Colombia. Among other things, the State should acknowledge its responsibility to Afro-Colombians, develop meaningful campaigns addressing racism towards people of African descent in Colombia, and create consciousness about and commitment to equity practices. She called for the State to demonstrate genuine political will to make existing ethno-education laws, programmes and policies effective and to ensure that scholarly texts and materials represented and valued the cultural, social and historical context of children of African descent in Colombia. 28. During the discussions, panellists discussed the importance of incorporating indigenous and traditional knowledge. Gay MacDougall, a member of the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, highlighting article 7 of the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, focused on formal and informal education as a means of broadly inculcating anti-racism. Civil society representatives spoke 7