Government of San Miguel de Allende promotes actions to prevent violence

Published December 16th, 2021

In order to impact San Miguel’s children and their parents, the Municipal Government continues to promote a culture of peace and violence prevention.

Through the “War Toy Exchange” crime prevention rally, the Municipal Public Safety Secretariat has approached more than 1,500 children in public elementary schools, both in the urban and rural areas.

Luis Miguel García, director of Crime Prevention of the Security Secretariat, explained that the aim is for the children of San Miguel to become promoters of peaceful actions in their families and to grow up with a healthy mind, leaving aside violent acts as a reaction to any personal or social conflict.

War toys are the seed that transmits elements of violence and that is what these activities are intended to do,” said the municipal official, adding that lower elementary students (first, second and third grades) are given workshops on “Values” and upper elementary students (fourth, fifth and sixth grades) are offered workshops on “Culture of Legality and Self-protection”.

In addition to focusing on the children, attention is also given to the parents, particularly the mothers, since school absenteeism has been detected as a result of problems such as alcoholism, the lack of a father figure, and the need for mother-child work.

“The breadwinner is the mother, the father is totally absent and the mother takes the children to work. Children are found working with their mothers. There is considerable absenteeism in the schools. We continue in our next stage of intervention now with mothers and fathers. There is a high level of alcoholism and it is going to be complex to incorporate them,” explained García Pérez.

Consequently, during this Rally, we also involve parents, with whom we work in special sessions on “Treatment and Care of Children”, with psychological talks; in this dynamic, teachers and school directors support with the logistics and reinforce the activities by combining the topics with the academic program already established by the Ministry of Public Education (SEP).

With this “War Toy Exchange” program, the Municipality gives talks and generates awareness dynamics among students about the Culture of Peace and Non-Violence, through a program with a Sports Rally with playful interactive and recreational work stations, with the participation of the different Public Safety agencies, The program included activities such as educational talks by municipal psychologists and criminologists, as well as a road culture lottery, an inflatable soccer field, an inflatable ladder, giant slang and other actions for integration among children.

As part of this program, the Ministry of National Defense (SEDENA) also participates in talks on the relevance and symbolism of exchanging guns and other toy weapons for balls, music players, and other items of entertainment and healthy coexistence. The Guanajuato State Public Safety Secretariat also participates with play material for the exchange of war toys.

This prevention program is permanent, it is ongoing and the areas with high levels of insecurity and disintegration of the social fabric are selected (according to the indicators of the Municipal Crime Map), and sectors are prioritized for intervention through this type of social proximity program in public schools; so far, the public elementary schools in the communities of Palo Colorado and Peña Blanca, as well as the elementary schools Independencia, José María Morelos, and Gabriela Mistral have already been intervened.

With violence prevention actions and the promotion of the Culture of Peace, in San Miguel de Allende we are returning to the good old days.