Community voices

We want to hear from you!

Have you noticed the artworks and quotes throughout this site?

These are all by young Aussies and we think they’re awesome!

Quotes

We are inviting kids, teens and young adults from anywhere and everywhere in Australia to tell us, in just a short sentence or two, something positive, interesting or inspiring about their communities,  something they love doing or enjoy being a part of.

Stories and art

Accepting artworks and stories soon

We want your stories, we want your questions, we want your shared knowledge, and above all, we want to hear from Australia’s youth – for kids, teens and young people to guide us. This is Children’s Guide after all!

Very soon we will be accepting artworks, as well as stories for our Festival of Storytelling happening later this year. We are super excited about this and can’t wait to share the details with you. Please subscribe to our emails to find out when we’re accepting submitions, and for guidelines and inspiration.

Information for submitting a quote

To submit a quote, please fill in your details on the form on this page.

What should I say?

You can say anything you want about your town or community area, something you enjoy doing, or something you appreciate. It can be about an activity you take part in at home or a place you go, with friends or family, and certainly anything that is unique to your community. It can also be gratitude for a service that helped you in some way, or anything that makes you feel safe, healthy, nurtured or happy. There are no wrong answers – just be positive and kind.

Will all quotes submitted be published?

Our team will review all quotes submitted. We will send a confirmation email within one or two business days letting you know that we’ve received your quote and if your quote is positive, kind, clear, meaningful or fun, we will let you know what date within a week it will be published and include a link to the page where it will appear. All quotes must have consent and we will not publish any quotes where our confirmation email bounces back – so please make sure you’ve spelt everything correctly.

We will not accept quotes with coarse language, discrimination or negativity towards others, and anything submitted which is offensive or of concern may be supplied to third parties.

Where will my quote appear?

If you write something about your local area or a local or home-based activity, your quote will appear in your local community area (see the list here) based on your suburb or town. Each community area has its own home page, then pages for the different services and resources available. Each page has a display which scrolls through the quotes received for that area. If we get a lot of quotes, we will create additional displays.

For example, if you live in Oakey in QLD, that’s in the Darling Downs community area. If you provided a quote about a sport or swimming in Oakey, it would appear in the Darling Downs Active Kids page, if you provided a quote about an appreciation for emergency services in your town, it would appear in the Darling Downs Emergency and Advice page, or if you have a favourite restaurant, that would appear in Darling Downs Family Dining.

If your quote is not specifically about your community area, but rather something you do, such as online gaming with your friends, it may appear in the Activities at home pages, or the Peers and independence – Internet safety pages, depending on what you say.

You can select the section and sub-section that your quote is about, then we’ll publish it to the relevant page and send you an email confirmation with a link.

Quotes may also appear on our social media and in our newsletter because we want to let others know positive things about all communities.

When will my quote appear and for how long?

Most quotes should be published within a week of being submitted, as long as they are positive, and the confirmation email does not bounce back.

At this stage, we see no reason for quotes to be removed, but will let you know if anything changes.

Who will read this?

Children’s Guide, and the quotes published throughout the site, can be viewed by anyone, anywhere with internet access, and we will be working hard to get our readers to visit the information, articles and resources on the pages where quotes appear.

All the pages and articles are free to view and there are no paywalls. Our site is child and family friendly and accessible to all (any sensitive articles will be preceded with trigger warnings). Our social media is not private and can be viewed by anyone with the relevant social media accounts, whether they follow us or not.

Once your quote has been published, you can also share it with your friends and family by forwarding or sharing the link in your confirmation email. (The link in your confirmation email will not contain any tracking and will be safe to share. The visibility of anything you share on social media will depend on your own privacy settings and the policies of those social platforms, and we recommend you review those often.)

Our team will regularly communicate with Australian communities, and we hope the more positive quotes we receive, the more people will stop by to read them.

Can I submit more than one quote, or write more than just a short quote?

Yes, you can – we all have more than one interest and we may feel positive about many things. It just shows that our communities can be diverse and engaging in many ways. A separate form needs to be filled in for each quote, and at this stage we won’t put a limit to how many one person can submit, but we will limit it to one quote per person, per section. If we start getting too many quotes from one person, we might send a friendly, polite email asking to just select a few.

If you really have a lot you’d like to say about your local community, perhaps you’d like to contribute an article instead. If this is something you’d like to do, please email us at publisher@childrensguide.net with your idea for an article, and if it’s suitable for Children’s Guide we will get back to you with the guidelines.

What if you get too many quotes?

Personally, we think – the more, the better! At this stage, we have 111 community areas for the purpose of Children’s Guide’s website and publications, which covers the whole country. Each community area has a variety of activities and resources.

There are products, services and issues which are relevant to everyone, plus we will regularly be adding articles, checklists, interviews and other resources. Just like the space in our beautiful and fascinating big country, we’re sure there’s plenty of space on this site for lots of quotes.

We will ensure that the quotes get evenly distributed, without too many on each display, so they all have a chance to be seen.

I've made a mistake; can I change or remove my quote?

As you’re writing what you’d like to say, carefully check the spelling and grammar. Perhaps write it down first or get a parent or teacher to check it for you. If we notice a spelling mistake, or if we think something is mistyped, we will clarify it in our confirmation email to you.

If you’ve changed your mind about your submission, you can ask for it to be removed by replying to our confirmation email at any time, or by emailing us at quotes@childrensguide.net. We will remove your quote and you can come back and submit a new one at any time.

Can our school take part as a classroom activity?

Yes, absolutely – and we encourage this! Please email us at quotes@childrensguide.net and request a Schools pack, which will give you all the information about having the entire school or individual classes submitting quotes, artwork and taking part in our Festival of Storytelling later this year.

Can I submit artworks or stories?

We will soon be accepting artworks for our website and stories for our upcoming Festival of Storytelling. To find out when you can submit these, please subscribe to our emails so that you’re up to date with what’s new, follow our social media or visit this page again soon.

How will you use my personal information?

By submitting a quote, you agree to have it published on Children’s Guide website, social media, and communications. However, we will not use your personal information for any other purpose, and we will only include the details that you chose to provide. This will be confirmed in an email to you prior to publication, which will show exactly how and where your quote will appear, and you will have time to cancel the quote before we publish it, or you can request to have it removed after it’s published.

We respect your privacy and the protection of children and their identities and will not share your email address or any other details you provide. You will not be added to any mailing list or receive our newsletters, and we will not use your email for any other purposes except to let you know when your child’s quote has been included, or to update you of any changes, such as updating the original page where your quote appears, although this will rarely happen.

You may contact us at any time to have your child’s quote removed by emailing quotes@childrensguide.net and we will respect your wishes. You can also simply email us if you have any questions or concerns. If you wish to subscribe to our mailing list, you can do so at the bottom of this page.

If we receive submissions which are inappropriate or of concern, we may refer these to third parties, including relevant authorities or child protection agencies.

If you are thinking of submitting a quote because something negative is happening and you need to reach out to someone, please contact one of the organisations on this page, and we do hope you’re ok.

Kids and teens, submit a quote

Only type the full surname or initial of surname if you would like either of those included, otherwise leave this blank. You can contact us to change this option at any time.
Parent consent required if under 13 years old
*General area, such as broader city or state area based on your town. This just helps us place the quote in the relevant community area.

We respect your privacy, your details will not be shared, you will not be added to any mailing list, and we will not use your email for any other purposes except to let you know when your child's quote has been included. You may contact us at any time to have your child's quote removed by emailing quotes@childrensguide.net and we will respect your wishes. If you wish to subscribe to our mailing list, you can do so at the bottom of this page.

Thank you, and you will receive a confirmation email when you’re quote has been added to our site.

If you would also like to receive your Community area newsletter every second month, please also include your postcode.
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Acknowledgement of Country

In the spirit of reconciliation Children's Guide acknowledges the Traditional Custodians of Country throughout Australia and the continuing connection to lands, waters and communities. We pay our respect to Elders past, present and emerging, and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples today.