By External Source
Nov 4 2025 (IPS-Partners)

 
Dr. David Edwards is the General Secretary of Education International, the voice of teachers and other education employees around the world. Through its 386 member organizations, Education International represents over 32.5 million teachers and education support personnel in 178 countries.

Dr. Edwards has led the organization since 2018, after seven years as Deputy General Secretary directing education policy, advocacy, research and communications. Prior to joining Education International, Dr. Edwards was an Associate Director at the National Education Association of the United States. He has worked as an Education Specialist at the Organization of American States and began his career as a public high school teacher.

Education International leads the teachers’ constituency within Education Cannot Wait’s (ECW) governance and, accordingly, Dr. Edwards represents the constituency within the Fund’s High-Level Steering Group.

ECW: Education International is a founding member of ECW. Together with our strategic partners, ECW investments have reached more than 14 million children with the safety, hope and opportunity of a quality education. Why should donors prioritize funding for education through multilateral funds such as ECW?

Dr. Edwards: Multilateral funds are essential to ensuring coordinated and sustainable support for education in emergencies. Let’s remember that they emerged in response to duelling agencies which led to duplication and wasted partners’ time. By pooling resources and aligning efforts across contexts and organizations, they reduce duplication and enable efficient use of funds. For donors facing shrinking aid budgets, this should be a top priority.

Multilateral mechanisms not only ensure that support is not fragmented, they also ensure that it meets local needs. This is thanks to the fundamentally democratic nature of multilateral mechanisms: funds like ECW provide a platform for inclusive decision-making with representation of all stakeholders, from global institutions and national governments to the teaching profession and civil society. From our perspective, it is critical that teacher organizations can meaningfully shape priorities and interventions, including in crisis settings. It ensures that funding decisions reflect the lived realities of teachers on the ground. Democratic representation of teachers also strengthens accountability: transparent and inclusive governance structures make a real difference in monitoring and tracking progress, to ensure that support actually reaches education communities that are most affected. You want to know if a school was built, a resource delivered or impact felt? Ask a teacher.

ECW: We will need 44 million additional primary and secondary teachers worldwide by 2030. On the frontlines of humanitarian crises – where teachers work in dangerous conditions with low pay – the challenges are daunting. How can the global community help we fill this gap?

Dr. Edwards: Millions of the most vulnerable children in the world are being condemned to a life of hardship because they don’t have access to a teacher. Stella Oryang Aloyo, a South Sudanese refugee teacher working in a refugee settlement in Uganda, asked the fundamental question we must keep in mind: “What is education without teachers?”

Classrooms are important but they are not enough. Books are important but they are not enough. Teachers are the heart of any education system and, in crisis contexts, they are all the more important. For children in emergency settings, access to a qualified and well-supported teacher can make the difference between hope for a better future and lifelong destitution and deprivation.

To address this shortage, the global community must invest in teachers in crisis settings as a top priority. This means ensuring that enough teachers are trained, recruited, and paid sufficiently and regularly. This last point is essential. Over the past few years, Education International has consistently warned that delayed, partial or irregular salary payment is one of the most pressing challenges facing teachers in emergencies and we have started documenting this issue. In South Sudan, at the time of publication of our study released in April 2025, teachers on government payroll had not been paid in over a year. In Yemen, Nigeria and many other contexts affected by crises, teachers experience severe delays and issues with the disbursement of their salaries.

These issues stem from fragmented funding, weak payroll systems, but also a lack of prioritization: a study published by INEE in 2022 revealed that the payment of teacher salaries is by far the most challenging area for which to secure funding in education in emergencies.

The impact on the continuity of education is huge because teachers have to look for other sources of revenue to support their families or they leave the profession altogether. As a result, education is disrupted.

This is also a matter of professional dignity: if we all agree that education cannot wait, then we have to acknowledge that teachers cannot wait either, and must take action accordingly.

Governments hold the primary responsibility to support and remunerate their workforce but, when everything falls apart, it is our responsibility as a global community to step up and support teachers. This requires flexible, multi-year funding mechanisms. It also means integrating teacher compensation into both emergency response and long-term recovery plans. If we are serious about ending the global teacher shortage and achieving Sustainable Development Goal 4 (SDG4), we must start by ensuring that every teacher, especially in crisis settings, is paid fully, fairly and on time.

ECW: Teachers are essential in achieving the goal of ensuring quality education for all by 2030 (SDG4). In the face of fast-changing technologies, budget constraints and other converging challenges, how can education be better delivered with coordination, speed and agility on the frontlines of fast-evolving humanitarian crises?

Dr. Edwards: To deliver education effectively in humanitarian crises, we must empower teachers and trust them. Coordination among all humanitarian and development actors is key, and teachers, through their organizations, must have a seat at the table. This will ensure that teachers are part of integrated response plans, not an afterthought.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, the whole world saw how teachers that had the tools, time, training and connectivity were able to adapt quickly and innovate to meet the needs of their students – regardless of the circumstances in which they were teaching. In the rush to deliver agile and cost-effective solutions, we must resist the temptation to prioritize technology over teachers. Speed and agility in education delivery must build upon teacher leadership at all levels, from engaging teacher organizations in designing responses, to trusting and empowering teachers to innovate as they deem appropriate for their students.

Digital technologies will never replace the human connection, contextual understanding and emotional support that teachers provide. This is particularly important in crisis settings, where children often face trauma, displacement and instability. A trained, caring teacher may be the only constant adult presence in children’s lives, offering not just education, but a sense of safety, psychosocial support and, most importantly, hope. I have seen teachers protect their students by creating human tunnels ushering them to safety. I have seen resource-strapped teachers give their own lunch to hungry students. And I have spoken with teachers who have had to throw themselves on top of students to protect them from a bomb blast. I am still waiting for an AI chatbot to outperform us in the area of caring and sacrifice.

ECW: Localization is a hallmark of the UN80 Initiative and Grand Bargain Agreements. How can ECW, Education International and other leading global organizations work together to tap the vast potential of local delivery models?

Dr. Edwards: From our perspective, localization is not just about shifting delivery, it is about shifting power. It begins with trust: global organizations must shift from directing to enabling local actors to lead response efforts. This means investing in local capacity by establishing and supporting mechanisms for social and policy dialogue that bring together education authorities and teacher unions. Such mechanisms ensure that education responses are not only contextually relevant, but also that those who are in charge of implementing them feel a sense of ownership and are fully on board. While funding must reach schools and students, it is equally important to invest in the institutional capacity of local actors to lead, coordinate and monitor implementation on the ground.

At Education International, we are committed to strengthening our members’ capacities, to ensure that teachers and their representatives participate actively and meaningfully in education policy development, implementation, monitoring and evaluation. We have seen multiple micro-innovations blossom into full-scale programmes and badly designed programmes collapse by failing to recognize local realities that any teacher could spot. We systematically and purposefully build spaces for local expertise to be shared and strengthened. By working together in this direction, we can contribute to building education systems that are more resilient, sustainable and accountable.

ECW: We all know that ‘readers are leaders,’ and that reading skills are key to every child’s education. What are three books that have most influenced you personally and/or professionally?

Dr. Edwards: On a personal level, I think Herman Hesse’s Narcissus and Goldmund came at a seminal moment because of both where I read it and what I learned from it.

Being from a small, rural Midwest town in the US, the chance to study abroad in high school helped me develop an opportunities mindset. Studying in Austria meant immersion in German around the clock with peers who pressed me for my views on politics and philosophy in ways I was unaccustomed to in Slippery Rock, Pennsylvania. Reading Narcissus and Goldmund in the original German and then discussing it with a close friend who wanted to know which character I identified more with fundamentally rewired my understanding of what was possible. The book itself, set in medieval Europe, beautifully illustrates one of humanity’s most fundamental post-Enlightenment tensions and debate about whether we are led by our passions or our intellect. It is also a touchstone for me about my friendships and relationships, the beauty of diversity and friendships that don’t fit neatly into a world that demands we fit in boxes and take sides.

Professionally, I love the writing of Andy Hargreaves and also when he writes together with Dennis Shirley. I was going to suggest their Global Fourth Way but I think I will land on Andy’s latest book – The Making of an Educator – which tells the story that all educators can relate to those first few years, and the deafening volume of the educational politics around us. What I love about Andy, who is one of the most quoted and well-known educational leadership researchers in the world, is the accessibility of his writing and the humanity it exudes. When I read his books, I imagine myself hiking a trail with him while he spins a yarn into a narrative web that’s part Bryson, part Bunyan and always illuminating.

Lastly, and this is really hard, I think reading I, Rigoberta by Rigoberta Menchu inspired me to study in Guatemala and learn its history. The book is told through the eyes of a young girl who questions the injustice of the horror she and her community are being subjected to; a realized and learned sense of justice from a place of deep sadness that moves from bystander to agency, resilience and bravery. People like Rigoberta, Mandela and Pepe Mujica who suffer unimaginable injustice and still wage peace, these are the stories we need right now, more than ever.

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By External Source
NEW YORK, Oct 13 2025 (IPS-Partners)

On today’s International Day of the Girl Child, Education Cannot Wait (ECW) and our strategic partners call for substantial new funding to ensure every girl impacted by crises is able to access 12 years of quality education.

Worldwide, 133 million girls are out of school today. In countries like the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the State of Palestine, Sudan and Ukraine, armed conflict, forced displacement and climate impact keep girls out of school. In Afghanistan, where oppressive policies deny girls their equal rights to education, the challenges are even more dire.

Education for girls is their right. It also leads to better lives, higher incomes and reduced child marriage. If all girls completed their secondary education, countries would gain between US$15-$30 trillion in lifetime productivity and earnings, according to the World Bank.

ECW investments across the globe are making a difference in the lives and life-long trajectories of millions of crisis-impacted girls. Of the 14 million children reached through ECW’s investments, 50% are girls.

ECW and its partners’ holistic support is improving enrolment and attendance, accelerating transition rates from non-formal programmes into formal school, and building the academic and social-emotional skills girls need to thrive. ECW’s latest Annual Results Report documents deepened investment in equitable access and learning; three in four programmes show gender-equitable improvements in participation.

In Uganda for example, an ECW-financed programme is showing strong improvements in foundational literacy for conflict and crisis-affected girls. At the lower primary level, the proportion of learners demonstrating basic reading skills rose from 18% to 34%, with girls outperforming boys. At the upper primary level, reading competency nearly doubled, with girls and boys achieving near parity.

To achieve the Sustainable Development Goals, we must accelerate and sustain financing for girls’ education.

Girls’ education is the single best investment we can make in building a better world.

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By External Source
Oct 9 2025 (IPS-Partners)

 
Mohamed M. Malick Fall was appointed as the United Nations Resident Coordinator in Nigeria in February 2024. He has more than 20 years of experience in the development, humanitarian and peacebuilding fields. Prior to his appointment, he served as the UNICEF Regional Director for Eastern and Southern Africa, where he provided oversight and guidance to 21 UNICEF Countries Offices, including on the formulation and implementation of the Country Programme Documents, the UN Reform process, and the engagement with the Regional and Economic Commission and African Union and the private sector.

Furthermore, Mr. Fall has led the response to multiple and complex crises with massive humanitarian needs and high security challenges, and managed the strategic review of the country documents, research and knowledge-management-related activities, ensuring that the results are used to inform programmes and policies.

Before that, he served as UNICEF Representative in Nigeria (2016–2019), Central African Republic (2014–2016) and Mongolia (2012–2014), as the Senior Education Adviser in Haiti (2010–2012), and as Chief of Education in Indonesia (2006–2010) and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (2003–2006). He was also temporarily assigned as Education Officer (2001–2003).

Mohamed M. Malick Fall has a Master’s degree in Demography from Université de Paris I Panthéon Sorbonne in France and a B.A. Degree in History (Licence d’Histoire) from Université de Dakar in Sénégal.

ECW: Today, there are 18.3 million children out of school in Nigeria. How can relevant organizations – UN agencies, civil society organizations and ECW – work better together with national/state/local governments to get these girls and boys into safe and protective learning environments?

Mohamed M. Malick Fall: Given the scale of the number of children that are out of school, building partnerships (as well as strengthening existing partnerships) at national, state and local level is one of the ways to support out-of-school children (OOSC) to get back to school or into alternative learning pathways. No single actor can address this challenge alone – it requires collective leadership, resources and innovation to address this profound challenge. Together with the Ministry of Education, UN agencies, civil society organizations, and religious and faith-based leaders, ECW must align their support with national education priorities. This way, interventions do not create parallel systems but instead strengthen and reinforce existing education structures.

Strengthening collaboration and leveraging resources is essential to achieving a clearly communicated goal of reducing the number of OOSC. The learning environment must be safe and conducive to encourage attendance and learning. Hence, ensuring that the learning environment is free from all forms of abuse and violence, providing inclusive classrooms for learners with disabilities, and equipping teachers with requisite skills and knowledge to support learners as need arises. The UN with ECW has demonstrated this through a Multi-Year Resilience Programme – which has brought together different INGOs and local NGOs, under the leadership of the three state governments, Borno, Adamawa and Yobe (BAY). This partnership resulted in about 200,000 children benefiting from various interventions. In addition, over 130,000 children in the BAY states will benefit from ECW-supported interventions. ECW, through its First Emergency Response, is also supporting over 100,000 boys and girls in insecurity prone areas of Northwest Nigeria to continue accessing formal and non-formal education in safe spaces. ECW’s approach of working through the cluster strengthens coordination, encourages government ownership and leadership and avoids duplication of efforts.

Aligning with the government’s plans for education is also key to sustainability of actions in addressing OOSC. The Nigerian Government’s Education Renewal initiative prioritizes the issue of OOSC in its agenda and continues to call on actors to collectively harmonize strategies and resources to answering these key questions ‘Who are they?’, ‘Where are they?’ and ‘Why are they OOSC?’

Additionally, at the national level, the UN continues to engage with the Federal Ministry of Education and its agencies such as the Universal Basic Education Commission, National Commission for Almajiri and Out-of-School Children with the aim of 1) keeping the issue of OOSC on the agenda of the government, 2) supporting development of policies and strategies for addressing the needs of OOSC, 3) implementing actions to ensure enrolment, retention and completion for learners, and 4) mobilizing and allocating resources for states in addressing these issues.

Finally, predictable and flexible funding is essential in Nigeria’s highly unpredictable context, where families are displaced multiple times. Donor support through ECW and other mechanisms is critical – not only to meet urgent needs but also to build resilience so education systems are protected during future crises.

ECW: Over your career, you have worked in some of the world’s most severe crisis contexts, including Afghanistan, Central African Republic, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Haiti, Indonesia (Banda Aceh post-tsunami) and Nigeria. Why should donors, the private sector and national governments invest in education as a building block for sustainable development?

Mohamed M. Malick Fall: When communities are destabilized by conflict, education is often the first service disrupted and the last to be restored. Yet, it is the one investment that gives children and youth the tools to rebuild their lives and societies. In my experiences in the conflict-affected and post-disaster countries in which I have served, education provides protection, keeping children safe from recruitment into armed groups, exploitation and harmful practices, and provides post-trauma recovery.

Having worked in countries that experienced the worst disasters of the past decades (for example, the 2004 tsunami in Indonesia and the 2010 earthquake in Haiti, each with over 200,000 lives claimed, millions displaced and massive destruction of infrastructure), I witnessed how education services were vital in bringing back normalcy to people’s lives and providing children with the psychosocial support they needed to recover from being separated from or having lost their parents and/or families. This is why I always carry the conviction that education in emergencies is a life-saving intervention, beyond the role it plays in immediate response as well as longer-term recovery.

Investing in education is not charity; it is a smart, long-term investment. Every dollar spent on education in conflict-affected countries is a critical contribution to building long-term human capital and resilience. Take Nigeria, for example: the country has a rapidly growing youth population, and if these young people are left without education and skills, it will create a crisis for the future.

However, if they are educated, they will be empowered to make informed health choices now and in the future, thereby leading to reduced maternal and child mortality, improved nutrition and stronger resilience against diseases. It is also important to mention that today’s socioeconomic progress is mostly based on people’s skills and knowledge, as shown by countries that have taken the lead on innovations such as new technology, artificial intelligence, etc. Therefore, in my view, in fragile contexts, education is not optional, but rather it is the foundation for recovery, peacebuilding, social cohesion and sustainable development.

It is the bridge between immediate humanitarian response and long-term stability. Without it, sustainable development simply cannot be achieved. Thanks to the generosity of donors, ECW has not only mobilized much-needed resources but also demonstrated that education response must begin at the very onset of a crisis.

ECW: As we embrace the Pact for the Future, Grand Bargain Agreements and the UN80 Initiative, how can we streamline efficiencies and activate local networks to deliver life-saving foundational education supports across the globe and make good on the promise of education for all as outlined in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development?

Mohamed M. Malick Fall: The objectives of these initiatives revolves around a similar theme – how nations can better align their resources to reach more, especially marginalized, conflict- and disaster-affected populations, and utilize local resources.

Partnership is key – where countries have found what works to better their foundational education, these proven approaches and interventions should be scaled up and with appropriate cultural context, establishing and building on the existing government structures, communities, local CSOs and NGOs (including youth organizations). The CSOs are closest to the grassroots; they can touch and reach many communities. We must shift from centralized delivery models to locally led solutions. The localization model is gaining real momentum within the humanitarian architecture. In Nigeria, for example, the Nigeria Humanitarian Fund allocates pooled funds directly to national NGOs, enabling them to deliver faster, more efficiently and in closer partnership with those on the frontlines. This approach is showing promising results. With continued investment in strengthening their institutional and technical capacities, national NGOs can take greater ownership of the response, ensuring that interventions are not only timely but also more sustainable and rooted in local realities.

The other example that remains indelible in my mind is from my tenure in the Central African Republic at the peak of the crisis there. At a time when many teachers had to flee from their positions due to religious and/or ethnic affiliation, many parents stepped in to replace them, serving as “maîtres-parents” (parent-teachers) and ensuring that children continued to receive education. The UN provided them with essential support such as basic training, teaching and learning materials. This is, to me, a great example of community engagement that maintained a sector as vital as education during one of the worst crises the country had ever experienced. The home-based schools that I saw in Afghanistan, created to provide education to girls whose right to education was denied by the Taliban, are another memory of community efforts to sustain education in the face of the strongest religious and cultural barriers.

When we go together, we achieve more. In this time of cuts to aid funding, we must align resources and avoid duplication of initiatives – so we can get more returns for every dollar invested. The availability of quality education data can help countries design and allocate resources to where it is most needed. The Federal Ministry of Education is investing a lot in the Nigeria Education Data Initiative – a government-led effort to centralize and modernize education data across all levels in Nigeria. This will help to align interventions to where it is needed most, design fit-for-purpose interventions and avoid duplication of efforts by the intervening agencies/partners.

Today, new technology offers unprecedented opportunities to accelerate both access and quality of education while, at the same time, reducing its cost. Teaching and learning can be done through low-cost tech solutions to reach maximum learners, as demonstrated during lockdown during the COVID-19 pandemic. Distance learning using new technology helped to avoid a lost generation. The acceleration of the Sustainable Development Goals related to education should make maximum use of the opportunities offered by new technology.

We can build a resilient local ecosystem that can support education for all children. By streamlining financing, empowering local networks and embedding education in crisis response, we can turn commitments under the Pact for the Future, the Grand Bargain and the UN80 Initiative into concrete action – making education not just a promise, but a guarantee for every child, everywhere, as envisioned in the 2030 Agenda.

ECW: Why is investing in girls’ education – especially for vulnerable girls on the frontlines of conflict, climate change, forced displacement and other protracted crises – so important?

Mohamed M. Malick Fall: Investing in girls’ education – especially for vulnerable girls living on the frontlines of conflict, climate change, forced displacement and protracted crises – is not only a moral imperative, but also a strategic investment in the country’s recovery, stability, resilience and long-term development.

There is global evidence on why it’s important to invest in girls’ education, with benefits including improved income for the girls, breaking down of the cycle of poverty, low maternal and child mortality rates, and shifts in social norms. Nigeria has made strides in improving the enrolment and retention of girls in schools. In conflict and protracted crisis regions, girls are reported to be at risk of sexual exploitation, gender-based violence and early and forced marriage. Investing in education for girls will reduce their vulnerability and provide an opportunity to contribute to development and build their confidence to make informed decisions about their lives and future. The UN and its partners are ensuring that girls who have been forced into child marriage and teenage motherhood (i.e. due to socio-cultural or economic barriers) have an opportunity to enrol in school and break the cycle of poverty and illiteracy. We have collaborated with the Federal Ministry of Education to develop national guidelines for the facilitation of re-entry of pregnant and married adolescent girls into school.

UNESCO estimates that child marriage would drop by 64% if all girls completed secondary education. Primary completion rate is around 73% for both boys and girls, according to the National Bureau of Statistics and UNICEF. Disparities in completion rates are shown at junior secondary school level with 69% for boys and 67% for girls; at senior secondary school, the completion rates are 57% for boys and 51% for girls. For example, the Girls’ Education Programme led by the UN brought back over 1.5 million girls in basic education and supported their retention programme. This initiative strengthened community efforts to enrol girls in school, encouraged completion and transition, and built resilience. As of July 2025, the capacity of over 290,000 girls in Kano, Jigawa and Sokoto was strengthened through Girls for Girls clubs that empowered communities to speak out around issues of gender-based violence and school safety concerns, according to UNICEF.

The UN in Nigeria is also supporting the Federal Ministry of Education to build the capacity of teachers across states to deliver Education for Health and Wellbeing to learners in Nigerian schools. Since 2020, over 3 million learners (boys and girls, especially in humanitarian settings) have been empowered with factual sexual and reproductive health information, and the required life skills to build their agency to be resilient and set goals towards becoming respectable adults.

ECW: We all know that ‘readers are leaders’ and that reading skills are key to every child’s education. What are three books that have most influenced you personally and/or professionally?

Mohamed M. Malick Fall: “L’enfant noir” by Camara Laye (The Black Child); “L’aventure ambigue” by Cheikh Hamidou Kane (The Ambiguous Adventure); “The Audacity of Hope” by Barack Obama.

The first book is about a child growing up in Africa who is very close to his mother and whose upbringing was supported by the extended family. This book touched me because it highlights the importance of the mother-child relationship in the development of a child’s character and how this is defining in determining how successful a child will be.

The second book is about a Senegalese child growing up in a context of interaction between Africans and Western culture. This book helped me to navigate and find the right balance between these two cultures growing up in post-independence Senegal, and studying in both my own country and in France.

The third book helped to strengthen my leadership, mainly working in a context of hardship and extreme human suffering, where hope remains a major factor in helping communities to recover from conflict and get back on their feet.

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By External Source
NEW YORK, Oct 6 2025 (IPS-Partners)

1 calls on people everywhere to provide teachers and the communities they serve with the resources they need to succeed in their crucial profession.

Today’s teachers need holistic teaching and learning methods, training on technology and the use of Artificial Intelligence, and other cutting-edge practices. And teachers cannot do their work without safe working conditions, fair pay and integrated support at the local, national and international level.

On the frontlines of the world’s most severe humanitarian crises – in places like Cox’s Bazar in Bangladesh, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Haiti and Sudan – teachers face unimaginable challenges, low pay – and sometimes no pay – overcrowded classrooms, limited technology, inadequate financial support and life-threatening violence.

To address these interconnected challenges, ECW and its donors are investing in teachers across the globe.

In 2023 and 2024, ECW invested in our strategic partners to train over 144,000 teachers (56% of them female) on topics including pedagogy, gender and disability inclusion, disaster-risk reduction, and mental health and psychosocial support services. 35,000 teachers (48% female) were also financially supported with salary assistance, renumeration of volunteer teachers and social provisions such as health care insurance or daycare facilities for teachers with children.

Together with national and international investments in education, ECW supports crisis-affected girls and boys with the foundational skills – such as reading, writing and mathematics – needed to become productive members of society.

Together, we must create enabling policies and provide adequate funding to ensure teachers everywhere have the safety, training and support they need to thrive in their profession. Teachers are frontline heroes tasked with educating our next generation of leaders.

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Excerpt:

By External Source
Sep 11 2025 (IPS-Partners)

 
Tom Dannatt is a Founder and CEO of Street Child, an international non-government organization active in over 20 disaster-hit and lowest-income countries – working for a world where all children are ‘safe, in school and learning’. Tom founded Street Child in 2008 with his wife Lucinda and has led the organization since its inception. Street Child leads the civil society constituency within ECW’s governance and, accordingly, Dannatt represents the constituency on the Fund’s High-Level Steering Committee.

ECW: In places like Nigeria, Pakistan and Uganda, Street Child is working together with local partners to provide children with holistic learning opportunities through ECW investments. How can we maximize the impact of these investments to ensure education for all?

Tom Dannatt: Street Child is really clear on this one – maximizing the role of local organizations is key to maximizing the immediate, and longer-term, impact of ECW’s investments. It has been a privilege for Street Child to work closely with ECW in recent years, through multiple grants, on practical strategies to bring this perspective to life. It is superb to see a prominent commitment to localization embedded in ECW’s strategy and being increasingly lived out through a growing norm of seeing local organizations playing significant roles in consortia delivering ECW investments.

An especially promising ‘next-level’ innovation that Street Child had the opportunity to trial in the present Multi-Year Resilience Programme (MYRP) in Uganda is what we have called the ‘localization unit’ approach. This saw a minimum portion of the MYRP budget being reserved purely for local organizations to competitively apply for, amongst themselves – free from competition with INGOs. Street Child, as the localization unit manager, conducted a uniquely inclusive, transparent and supportive application process; and has since provided hands-on management and assistance to the five successful grantees to help them maximize the impact of their award and fulfill all necessary reporting and compliance demands.

I was in Uganda myself a few weeks ago (in fact, I had to join a 90-minute ECW High-Level Steering Group call by a dusty roadside, surrounded by a group of curious children!) It was mid-way through the final year of the MYRP, and I witnessed first-hand phenomenal, sophisticated, transformative programming being delivered by all five of these organizations – work of a quality that I am sure the most famous global charities would have been proud to have showcased to any donor. And here is the thing – for all five of these local NGOs, this was the first time they had ever received a grant from a global donor; but now, not only had they ‘smashed it’ in terms of delivering great impact with the ECW funds awarded, most of them had gone on – using the credibility of being an ECW-grantee and the experience gained of successfully managing an award from a demanding global donor – to win further institutional grants themselves. Without exaggeration, ECW’s bold initiative in establishing this ‘localizations unit’ has transformed the ability of these organizations to attract the support they so richly deserve – and their ability to serve refugee children long after this MYRP closes. This is real, lasting impact.

ECW: Street Child leads the civil society constituency of Education Cannot Wait’s High-Level Steering Group and Executive Committee. How is civil society coming together with donors, governments, UN agencies, the private sector and local non-profits to position education – especially for children caught in humanitarian crises – at the top of the international agenda?

Tom Dannatt: Street Child is proud to follow in the footsteps of Plan International, Save the Children and World Vision in leading the civil society constituency within ECW. What this means is that I, as CEO, sit on the High-Level Steering Group; and then my colleague Tyler Arnot, who many in the sector know well as co-coordinator of the Global Education Cluster, sits on the ECW Executive Committee. And together, we try to faithfully and fearlessly bring the voice of civil society into these key fora!

We take this role incredibly seriously: because it really matters. Civil society has been central to this mission from the very beginning. ECW itself was born out of years of sustained civil society advocacy to close the funding gap for education in crisis. And the need for civil society to bring the same vital, fresh ground-level perspective to ECW’s ongoing decision-making remains as strong today – not least given the winds of extreme change blowing through our sector today.

For Street Child to credibly and effectively represent the voice and views of civil society, it is essential that we regularly convene the sector, and we do – online, of course, but also in-person wherever possible. For example, this June on the sidelines of ECW’s Executive Committee meetings in Geneva, we brought together civil society representatives, local NGOs, youth constituencies and INGO partners to strategize on coordination, funding and sustaining support for Education Cannot Wait. We held two days of intensive, passionate discussion at the EiE Hub and then in the main conference centre which helped shape ECW priorities and ensured that the most vulnerable children remain central to decision-making at this critical moment in ECW’s evolution. Bad news: both rooms we booked were too small! Which, of course, is actually good news, because it shows how much passion there is in our community, how relevant they see our fora and the need to come together in these important but complex times.

Looking ahead, we will continue this work later this month in New York on the edges of UNGA, where Street Child will co-host a discussion with ECW focused on local leadership and locally-led partnerships in education in emergencies. Robert Hazika, the Executive Director of YARID – one of the five local NGOs who received awards from the Uganda localization unit that I mentioned earlier – will join us.

ECW: In the face of limited resources, why should donors and the private sector invest in education through multilateral funds such as Education Cannot Wait?

Tom Dannatt: The dangerous ‘lacuna’ that education in emergencies naturally rests in makes the case for investing in a strong, relevant and loud ECW, as a champion for the sector, incredibly important.

Education for children affected by emergencies is so obviously utterly vital – and right – few decent people would disagree. But it is so easy to miss because it sits in this tricky lacuna. Because, on the one hand, for too many humanitarians, education seems a less visceral and less apparently urgent ‘life-saving’ priority than food, water, shelter – a view can exist that education is inherently a long-term venture so ‘best left to the development community’. Meanwhile, much of that development community will look at a warzone, the aftermath of an earthquake or a refugee camp and say, ‘oh no, this is not the sort of context we are set up to work in’ … And so whilst everyone agrees that educating children in emergencies is critical – all to easily, no one does it: it falls between the cracks. And that is why ECW is so critical – yes to be a superb funder; but equally, and perhaps more so, to be this urgent loud voice for these ‘inconvenient children’ demanding the ‘developmental initiative of education’ in a ‘humanitarian situation’. And ensuring they do not fall between any of our structural cracks.

And then, of course, you have the unique character and fundamental qualities of ECW that make it a compelling proposition – a collective platform to impact education-in-emergencies that truly brings together governments, donors, civil society and the private sector – to coordinate, reduce duplication and ensure more resources flow directly to children’s learning, as quickly as possible!

A final word on the importance of speed and duration: we know that for every day a child is out of school, it becomes increasingly unlikely that they ever return, so ECW’s speed, especially through its First Emergency Responses is absolutely critical – and unique. On the other hand, most other humanitarian funds for education are often too short to ensure continuity of learning. Quality education cannot be provided in 6-12 months, and the Multi-Year Resilience Programmes allow for greater predictability in providing education services in a protracted crisis.

ECW: Education is life-building and life-sustaining. How can investments in quality education and foundational learning support our vision for a world without war, without hunger and without poverty?

Tom Dannatt: The first emergency I experienced professionally was Ebola, 11 years ago. I wouldn’t be talking to you today if it wasn’t for what I, and Street Child, learned in those days: it shaped us. But the point I want to remember here is where were the last, and hardest, places to shake Ebola from? It was the least educated villages.

Where have I heard young people talk the most casually about joining armed groups? In unstable societies offering little prospects or hope for the future.

If you come across a child alone at night on the streets of some West African market town and ask them how they came to be there – many times, the answer you’ll get is a story that begins in a village with no school and then a venture to the town to try and find an education that hasn’t worked out. These are the type of conversations that launched Street Child into the education sector more broadly, fifteen years ago. Children thirst for education. It is the world’s responsibility, whatever the circumstances, to meet that thirst.

Education underpins health. Education builds safety and security. Education builds hope and promise for the future – in dire settings such as emergency contexts, the importance and power of ‘hope’ cannot be overstated. Humans with hope can do extraordinary things.

When we invest in education in emergencies, we invest directly into the most powerful idea around – that today will be better than tomorrow. That is exciting anywhere, no more so than if you have the misfortune of growing up in one of the world’s most crisis-affected places.

ECW: We all know that ‘readers are leaders’ and that reading skills are key to every child’s education. What are three books that have most influenced you personally and/or professionally?

Tom Dannatt: What a question … On any given day, I could probably give a different answer, but here are the three that leap to mind today.

Team of Rivals by Doris Kearns Goodwin, the Lincoln biography they made into a film, is over 900 pages but so good that I’ve read it twice! Moral courage and vision, character, empathetic leadership, unity from division, strategy, humility and self-confidence … there is so much there. I like a good biography.

We started Street Child in 2008. I read Bottom Billion by Paul Collier in 2007 and was engaged by the core thesis that whilst much of the world was gradually getting better, there were corners of the world where the ‘rising tide was not lifting all boats’ because they were ‘detached’ from the factors gradually driving global prosperity up. And that these places were where extra effort and aid was especially needed and best directed. I see the work of Street Child, and of course ECW, very much in these terms – giving children in the toughest situations a chance to gain the skills that will allow them to take part in everything this world has to offer.

Finally, to switch off, I love a sports book. And if a better sports autobiography than Andre Agassi’s Open is ever written, I so much look forward to reading it. Searingly and surprisingly honest (one of the most memorable players to ever wield a racket, yet hated tennis most of his life!), vulnerable, compelling, yet ultimately incredibly inspiring.

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By External Source
Aug 21 2025 (IPS-Partners)

Dr. Faiza Hassan is the Director of the Inter-Agency Network for Education in Emergencies (INEE). A chemical engineer who transitioned into education leadership, Dr. Hassan brings close to 20 years of diverse experience in education, social policy reform and humanitarian response. She has a proven track record in strategic management, technical leadership and driving impactful, large-scale complex programmes.

ECW: With international aid shrinking across the world, why should public and private sector donors continue to prioritize investment in quality education for children living through the world’s most severe humanitarian crises?

Dr. Faiza Hassan: Education is a fundamental human right. Every girl and boy, in every country, is entitled to it. States hold the primary responsibility for ensuring its provision, but in humanitarian crises, governments are often unable to fulfil this role – leaving millions of children without access to learning. Today, more than 234 million children and adolescents have their education impacted by crises worldwide.

During conflict or crisis situations, education becomes more than a classroom activity. It offers safety, stability and hope. It provides children with psychosocial support, helping them process trauma and rebuild a sense of normalcy. Schools often serve as community hubs, connecting children and their families to other critical services like school meals, vaccinations and health care.

Education is also the foundation for achieving peacebuilding, economic recovery, climate resilience, public health, gender equality and stronger governance. Education equips young people with the skills and knowledge to adapt to climate change, lead in their communities and challenge harmful norms. Without it, interventions in health, livelihoods and governance will always be less effective, less sustainable and less equitable.

Education is always what local communities in crisis are prioritizing. Parents in refugee camps, teachers in conflict zones, community leaders facing displacement – they consistently choose to invest what little they have in keeping children learning. Not because it’s easy, but because they know it is the single most powerful tool for securing their children’s future. In 2022, household contributions accounted for 25.8% of education spending in low-income countries and, in comparison, donor funding accounted for 12% of total education spending in low-income countries. So, for donors (both public and private sector), this isn’t about leading the way; it’s about getting behind and supporting communities who are already showing us what matters most.

In a time of shrinking aid budgets, protecting and expanding investment in education is not optional; it is the most strategic and cost-effective investment we can make. If we want to solve the world’s greatest challenges, from climate change and public health to economic inequality, we must stand behind communities to invest in education. Failing to act now will deepen instability, escalate humanitarian needs and undermine progress across all global priorities.

ECW: INEE and Education Cannot Wait (ECW) share a commitment to ensuring that all children affected by crises have access to quality, relevant and safe education. What practical steps are needed to turn this shared vision into reality?

Dr. Faiza Hassan: The Inter-agency Network for Education in Emergencies (INEE) was founded in 2000 on the fundamental right to education. Today, it is a global network of more than 22,000 members affiliated with 4,000 organizations across 190 countries, bringing together practitioners, governments, local and regional civil society, teachers, youth, students and researchers working to secure safe, quality, relevant and equitable education in emergencies and protracted crises.

Together with other partners, INEE helped build the case and momentum for a global fund dedicated to education in emergencies, leading to the creation of ECW. INEE and ECW therefore share not only history, but a complementary role within the EiE architecture. INEE convenes the EiE community, sets shared norms and standards, and builds evidence and capacity; ECW mobilizes and deploys finance to scale delivery. Together, we turn commitments into funded action with partners.

To continue to turn our shared commitment into a lived reality for every girl and boy, I think we need to double down on:

• • Centering local leadership. Communities already know what quality, relevant and safe education looks like in their context. We hear this from INEE members – from a teacher in Uganda, to a grassroots organization in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and a youth-led network in South Sudan – all leading the way in shaping education for their communities. Our role as global actors is not to prescribe, but to back their vision with resources, technical support and political advocacy. That means partnering with national governments, teacher unions, youth-led networks and grassroots education groups as leaders who set the agenda, not as downstream implementers.

• • Breaking the humanitarian-development divide. Education in emergencies cannot be a parallel track. It must be embedded into national education planning, policy and financing from day one of a crisis. This is how we ensure that children don’t just have access to school in the short term, but to pathways for lifelong learning.

• Financing that matches the scale and duration of the need. While ECW supports fast and flexible funding, we also need to think about flexible financing mechanisms that can adapt to protracted crises and support national systems, while also resourcing the local organizations who are often the first and last responders.

ECW: Localization is essential in delivering on the Grand Bargain Agreements, the Sustainable Development Goals and the Pact for the Future. How can we reinforce stronger enabling environments to empower local actors in the education sector?

Dr. Faiza Hassan: To answer this question, we need to start by being clear about what localization is and what it is not.

Localization is not about bringing local actors into the existing humanitarian system; it is about rewiring the system to serve and center them. That distinction matters because the current architecture was never built with local leadership in mind; it was built to manage donor risk, uphold donor priorities, and control resources and decision-making.

We must be honest that retrofitting a system never designed for community-led response will only take us so far. We need to stop asking how to make space for local actors within global structures, and start asking: What would this system look like if it were built from the ground up by the communities we claim to serve?

To create enabling environments in the education sector, we must let go of old assumptions that international actors are best placed to assess, coordinate, define or lead. We must let go of funding models that entrench dependency, and coordination structures that exclude the very people doing the work. Many of INEE’s members speak about rigid compliance frameworks, limited direct access to funding, and an over-reliance on international intermediaries that sideline local leadership. Changing this requires political will and a full structural redesign; technical tweaks will not suffice.

This is where the power of a diverse network matters. When ministries, local authorities, teachers and school leaders, youth and parent groups, grassroots organizations, researchers, funders and the private sector come together, we unlock our shared expertise. Collectively, we can redesign institutions, financing pathways and accountability mechanisms so they serve local actors.

With a diverse coalition, this is a moment of real possibility. The humanitarian reset, the UN at 80, and the global stock take on aid effectiveness offer an opening. We must be bold enough to use it. Our goal cannot be to diversify participation in a system that continues to marginalize; it must be to design one that stands behind and is led by local actors.

ECW: How do investments in girls’ education support efforts to build global security, ensure economic resilience and create more fair and equal societies?

Dr. Faiza Hassan: Investments in girls’ education drive healthier families, stronger economies and more stable societies. Educated girls are healthier, their children are healthier, and they are more likely to participate in the workforce and civic life – which strengthens economic resilience and more equal governance. In crisis contexts, the returns are even greater. Education can delay early marriage, reduce vulnerability to exploitation, and provide skills and networks that help communities recover.

Without education, investments in health, livelihoods, and protection deliver less and do not last. That is why INEE’s Guidance Note on Gender and other gender-responsive tools stress the need to integrate equity and inclusion into every aspect of emergency education planning, from safe learning environments to curriculum, teacher support and community engagement. These resources provide practical ways to ensure that girls’ education in crisis is not only accessible, but relevant, protective and transformative.

Families and communities already understand this, which is why they make sacrifices to keep girls in school. The least we can do is match their commitment with investments that uphold every girl’s right to learn, even in the most challenging circumstances.

ECW: We all know that ‘readers are leaders’ and that reading skills are key to every child’s education. Which three books have most influenced you – personally or professionally – and how have they shaped your perspective on education and resilience?

Dr. Faiza Hassan: Stories help children make sense of the world and find their place in it. They can spark imagination, nurture curiosity and offer comfort. They also build the confidence and continuity that help keep learning alive during times of upheaval.

I have always loved reading. I’ve read thousands of books across different genres, but fantasy and sci-fi have a special place in my heart. Over the years, there are some books that stand out to me, not because of their content, but because of what they gave me at key moments in life.

• •

Majalat Majid:

• A weekly Arabic children’s comic magazine that I read growing up in Yemen, where my family found a new home after leaving Somalia. It was my introduction to stories with familiar characters, humor and adventure, planting the seed for a lifelong love of reading.

• •

De Vijf:

• The Dutch translation of Enid Blyton’s The Famous Five. I read it shortly after my family was displaced from our home in Taiz and resettled in a small Dutch village. I was ten, and it was the first book I picked up in our local library. More than just a story, it gave me confidence, a foothold in a strange new place, and the sense that maybe things would be okay.

• •

And Then There Were None

by Agatha Christie: I read it as a teenager, adapting to yet another new environment. Turning each page without having to stop or translate gave me a quiet but lasting confidence that shaped my belief in my own ability to adapt and thrive.

These books, and so many others, were more than entertainment; they were anchors during moments of transition and a reminder of why access to books can be life-changing for children facing disruption today. Access to age-appropriate storybooks, comics, fantasy series, adventure tales, mystery novels, poetry collections, graphic novels, and even simple magazines help children and adolescents regulate, belong and learn. Books are not just tools for literacy, they are sources of managing uncertainty, connection and hope. If we want girls and boys in crisis to thrive, investments must include access to stories alongside safe schools, trained teachers and predictable financing.

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By Yasmine Sherif
NEW YORK, Jul 14 2025 (IPS-Partners)

On the first International Day of Hope, we are all responsible to #KeepHopeAlive for the children impacted by the world’s most severe humanitarian crises. Perhaps the strongest responsibilities lie with those entrusted to lead the world and make the right moral and legal choices. This is especially so today, when we have led the world into an abyss of excruciating pain for nearly a quarter of a billion innocent children now suffering brutal conflicts and violence, forced displacement and punishing climate disasters – without quality education.

Now is the time for genuine empathy and profound maturity among all of us who were privileged to access quality education. We are all connected, and we are all responsible for the young generation. We must serve as role models and pave the way for a better future.

Our investment in their education is an investment in peace, an investment in sustainable development, an investment in economic prosperity, and an investment in the unique potential of the world’s children and youth. Just like we once enjoyed such investment or made such investment in our own children.

Our world is changing fast. Across the globe – in Gaza, eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ukraine, Sudan and beyond – children and adolescents have no access to education and are losing hope. To make matters worse, we have a compounding climate crisis directly impacting the education and lifelong trajectories of every girl and boy on Earth.

To keep hope alive, Education Cannot Wait (ECW) and our global strategic partners go full force together to make whatever difference we can make in the life of each child we meet, providing them with safe, quality education that brings them hope, builds self-reliance and an ability to survive and thrive with dignity.

As we actively embrace the UN80 Initiative, we all must work together, comply with the UN Charter and stand by the promises made in 1945. By working together, we can and must ensure that every child and adolescent calling for help to reclaim hope is heard. We cannot turn a deaf ear to their desperate cries.

By investing in their potentials and by recognizing their extraordinary resilience, quality education will change their lives and their entire world view. This is the time to #KeepHopeAlive and not turn away as their hopes crumble. They live through darkness. We must kindle their light.

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Excerpt:

By Yasmine Sherif
NEW YORK, Jun 16 2025 (IPS-Partners)

As we commemorate International Day of the African Child, we honor the courage, resilience and dreams of millions of children and youth across Africa. Their potential is limitless, their right to a quality education is non-negotiable.

There is clear evidence highlighting the value of education in building strong economies and ensuring peace and stability across the continent. Foundational learning has the potential to double the GDP per capita in sub-Saharan Africa by 2050, according to the World Bank. Additional analysis indicates that every US$1 invested in tripling pre-primary education enrolment in sub-Saharan Africa can generate up to US$33 in returns.

With just a small investment in education for all of Africa’s children, we could transform a continent, open vast untapped markets, and deliver on the promises outlined in the Pact for the Future and the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.

Yet, too many children are being left behind. About half of the world’s 234 million crisis-impacted school-aged children reside in sub-Saharan Africa, according to Education Cannot Wait (ECW). Learning poverty is further exacerbating cycles of poverty, displacement and crises. Did you know that four out of five African children cannot read or understand a simple text by age 10?

To address these challenges, we must invest in quality education for the youngest and fastest-growing continent in the world. Across Africa, ECW investments have already reached over 7.4 million girls and boys, with a focus on foundational learning, gender equality, teacher training and psychosocial support – a whole-of-child learning approach.

Today – expanding on the African Union’s ‘Year of Education 2024’ efforts to build resilient education systems for increased access to inclusive, lifelong, quality and relevant learning in Africa – we call on world leaders, donors and the private sector to fund education in emergencies through proven multilateral funds like Education Cannot Wait.

We can and we must keep hope alive for the children of Africa.

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Excerpt:

By Yasmine Sherif
NEW YORK, Jun 12 2025 (IPS-Partners)

As we mark today’s World Day Against Child Labour, we must confront an urgent global truth: over 160 million children around the world are engaged in child labour – many of them in the most dangerous, degrading and life-limiting conditions imaginable. These are children forced to work in fields, factories and conflict zones – deprived of their right to safety, to dignity and, above all, to an education.

At Education Cannot Wait (ECW), we know that education is the single most powerful tool we have to break this cycle of poverty, exploitation and lost potential. Education offers children worldwide a pathway to a better life: a life where their dreams, not their circumstances, define their future.

In crisis-affected contexts, where children are most at risk, access to quality education is truly a lifeline – shielding girls and boys from violence, forced labour, child marriage, trafficking and other atrocities.

Together, we are doing something about it. Delivered with our strategic donor partners, ECW’s investments have already reached over 11 million children and adolescents in crisis settings. This is an investment in an end to child labour, an end to unfair working conditions, an end to cycles of poverty, displacement, violence and chaos.

This global crisis demands global action. We must increase financing for education in emergencies and protracted crises, strengthen child protection systems, and empower communities to keep children – especially girls and boys living on the frontlines of the world’s most severe humanitarian crises – safe and in school.

ECW calls on world leaders, donors, civil society and the private sector to unite in solidarity and take bold, collective action. Every dollar invested in education is an investment in sustainable economic development, global security and resilient societies. Every dollar invested in education is an investment to end child labour – now and forever.

Let us act with urgency. Let us act with compassion. And let us act with the unwavering belief that every child – regardless of who they are or where they live – has the right to a quality education and the freedom to learn, grow and thrive.

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Excerpt:

Education is a humanitarian lifeline for the world’s most vulnerable children. Our investment in their education today is an investment in global security, economic stability and continued growth in the 21st century.

By Yasmine Sherif
NEW YORK, May 26 2025 (IPS-Partners)

The challenges facing many parts of the African continent today are vast and immense. From the surge in violence in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo to all-out-war in Sudan, years of progress are being obliterated by bombs, killings and other grave violations of international law.

The single best investment we can make in addressing these multiplying humanitarian crises is an investment in the vast potential and talents of Africa’s younger generations. By investing in their education, we empower them to prevent conflicts, end extreme poverty and ensure economic development, peace and stability. Without investing in education as part of this broader vision, none of these imperatives will be materialized.

The returns on investment are significant. As noted by the World Bank, foundational learning has the potential to double the GDP per capita in sub-Saharan Africa by 2050.

Responding to the education funding gap

Many traditional donor countries have dramatically reduced humanitarian aid in the past year, with recent analysis from UNESCO revealing a concerning drop of 14% in global aid to education. Yet, we all want to see a stable and prosperous Africa – a continent that deserves no less.

Still, Africa is falling even further behind. Estimates from UNESCO indicate that, worldwide, there is a US$100 billion funding gap to reach the goal for universal education as outlined in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, with US$70 billion of this gap found in sub-Saharan Africa.

Learning poverty is a concerning global trend. Nowhere is this more pressing than across Africa. Around four out of five African children cannot read or understand a simple text by age 10, according to UNESCO, and many struggle with basic numeracy skills.

Compounding challenges like conflict, climate change and forced displacement are derailing development gains and impeding access to life-saving education in humanitarian crises – an investment that is indispensable to achieve peace and economic prosperity. According to the recent global estimates study by Education Cannot Wait (ECW), about half of the world’s 234 million crisis-impacted school-aged children reside in sub-Saharan Africa.

An entire generation is being left behind. “Although 75 million more African children are enrolled in school today compared to 2015, the number of out-of-school children has increased by 13.2 million to over 100 million during the same period,” according to the 2025 Transforming Learning and Skills Development in Africa report.

You cannot have sustainable economic growth without stability. And you cannot achieve stability without education. Africa is a continent on the move, a continent of forced displacement as a consequence of armed and violent conflicts, as well as climate change.

“In 2020, 21 million Africans were living in another African country. Since 1990, the number of African migrants living outside of the region has more than doubled, with the growth in Europe most pronounced. In 2020, most African-born migrants living outside the region were residing in Europe (11 million), Asia (nearly 5 million) and North America (around 3 million),” according to the World Migration Report.

Our collective failure to respond to this pressing education crisis will have dire global consequences.

The situation in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo

Just look at the terrifying situation unravelling in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). This region has been plagued by violence for decades, but it’s gotten much, much worse in recent months.

In all, there are an estimated 3.5 million forcibly displaced children in DRC today. Millions risk unimaginable violations of their human rights, including killing, maiming, abduction and forced recruitment into armed groups. There are also unconscionable accounts of sexual violence against girls. In eastern DRC, a child is reported raped every half an hour, according to UNICEF.

How can we tolerate the magnitude and depth of young girls and boys being systematically raped and killed? “More than 79 million girls and women – over 1 in 5 – across sub-Saharan Africa have experienced rape or sexual assault before turning 18,” according to UNICEF. Let’s put that number in perspective. That’s more than the total population of Australia and Spain combined.

For the children living in the midst of this chaos and fear, the options are limited. For girls, it’s a future as a child bride, continued poverty and early pregnancies. For boys, it might look like forced recruitment into terrorist organizations and other armed groups, forced labour or migration. For the world, this means growing forced displacement and migration, deeper and more widespread insecurity across the Global South, unstable markets, unstable populations and unstable futures.

The consequences of the war in Sudan

The situation in Sudan is soul-shattering and must end now. Recent estimates indicate that 30 million people require humanitarian assistance, including 16 million children. More than 12 million people have been displaced inside and outside Sudan since April 2023, straining education systems, budgets and capacity in neighbouring countries.

In all, the conflict and continuing challenges – including forced displacement, climate change, poverty and other factors – have left about 16.5 million children out of school in Sudan.

Education is the solution

As the global fund for education in emergencies and protracted crises in the United Nations, Education Cannot Wait (ECW) and its strategic partners are making a value proposition to increase humanitarian funding for education in Africa and beyond. In doing so, we contribute to joint programming on education, hence the broader goal of peace, stability and economic development.

There is a strong economic argument to be made. Africa is the youngest, fastest growing continent on earth – 6 out of 10 people are under the age of 25.

Within all that youth and energy lies opportunity. According to the World Bank, there is a 10% increase in hourly earnings for every extra year of schooling.

At the same time, taken at a macro-economic level, the opportunity costs are unprecedented. “This generation of students now risks losing a combined total of US$21 trillion in lifetime earnings in present value, or the equivalent of 17% of today’s global GDP – a sharp rise from the 2021 estimate of a US$17 trillion loss.”

The returns on investment in sub-Saharan Africa may be even more substantial, with some analyses indicating that every US$1 invested in tripling pre-primary education enrolment can generate up to US$33 in returns.

A lasting legacy

Education – as a transformative, immediate, life-saving and long-term investment –breaks cycles of poverty, displacement and conflict. Only then can we achieve peace, stability and economic development.

Deep inside us, we all agree that we can do better as a global community. We all know, instinctively, that the world would be a better place if we reduced global military spending – topping US$2.7 trillion – and instead invested in education, health, governance, infrastructure and livelihoods. We do know that we can be creative and turn vision into practical results. All it takes is investing just 0.02% (US$600 million) of this into education – and similar amounts into other sectors – which, together, provide the transformational power to build stability, spread peace and generate significant economic returns. This is not just logic. This is a legacy worth living.

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Excerpt:

By Yasmine Sherif
NEW YORK, May 23 2025 (IPS-Partners)

22 May 2025, New York – In the past two months alone, more than 950 children have reportedly been killed in strikes across the Gaza Strip. That’s 15 children every day who lose their lives in this horrific conflict. Those who survive face the risk of famine, illness, and the collapse of essential services, including education.

As the global fund for education in emergencies and protracted crises in the United Nations, Education Cannot Wait (ECW) stands ready with our partners to support the delivery of mental health and psychosocial services as part of our education in emergency response to the children who have suffered so much over the past 19 months. Today, no child is safe in Gaza.

The education system is in ruins. Since the onset of hostilities, more than 95% of schools in Gaza have been partially or completely destroyed and 88% will require significant reconstruction before they can function, according to the Global Education Cluster.

More than 658,000 children are out of school – they are deeply traumatized, have lost their homes and their loved ones, and are living a daily life of extremely painful survival.

As UNICEF recently stated: “The daily suffering and killing of children must end immediately.”

For the well-being of children to be protected, safe access to education must urgently be restored. Even amidst the destruction, Gaza’s families, teachers and local organizations are doing what they can to mitigate the enormous impact on children, including limited learning activities where conditions allow. Through ECW’s support to partners on the ground, we must help these innocent children.

But this is far from being enough to meet the needs of the entire population of school-aged girls and boys. To scale up urgent education support, a ceasefire is crucially needed. We call for:

• An end to hostilities and respect for international humanitarian law by all parties
• Safe, unimpeded humanitarian access
• The immediate release of all hostages
• Protection of civilians and civilian infrastructure, including schools

As Tom Fletcher, Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator, said in his statement to the UN Security Council: “Our response as humanitarians is to make a single ask of the Council: let us work. The UN and our partners are desperate to resume humanitarian aid at scale across Gaza, in line with the fundamental principles of humanity, impartiality, independence and neutrality.”

Where children suffer excruciating pain, nothing can wait. Yet, the children in Gaza are desperately waiting for a response to this single ask.

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Excerpt:

By External Source
May 14 2025 (IPS-Partners)

 
Tom Fletcher is the United Nations Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator, OCHA. He started his official duties on 18 November 2024.

Prior to taking up this role, Fletcher was the Principal of Hertford College at Oxford (2020-2024) and Vice Chair of Oxford University’s Conference of Colleges (2022-2024). He was British Ambassador to Lebanon (2011-2015) and Number 10 Foreign Policy Adviser to three UK Prime Ministers (2007-2011).

Fletcher previously served as Global Strategy Director of the Global Business Coalition for Education (2015-2019) and as chair of the UK Creative Industries Federation (2015-2020). He was awarded a CMG in 2011.

Fletcher has worked closely with the United Nations during his diplomatic career in Africa, the Middle East and Europe, including leading a report on technology for the UN Secretary General (2017). He is the author of ‘The Naked Diplomat’ (2016), ‘Ten Survival Skills for a World in Flux’ (2022), and two novels, ‘The Ambassador’ (2022) and ‘The Assassin’ (2024). He has written for the Financial Times, Prospect and Foreign Policy Magazine, and presented a BBC series on democracy.

Fletcher holds a Master of Arts degree in Modern History (Oxford, 1998). He was Visiting Professor at New York University (2015-2020) and the Emirates Diplomatic Academy (2016-2019). He is fluent in English and French, and has a good working knowledge of Arabic and Swahili.

ECW: How can education – especially for the 234 million crisis-affected children in urgent need of education support – better strengthen efforts to protect civilians, ensure human rights and foster adherence to international humanitarian law?

Tom Fletcher: Education is a frontline necessity in humanitarian crises – not an afterthought or something that can be dealt with later. Everywhere I go, I see how education provides children with a sense of normalcy, safety and hope amid the chaos. Learning is a shield against the threats and trauma of war and disaster. A child in school is less likely to be recruited by armed groups, exploited or harmed – and at its best, education instills values of peaceful coexistence, dignity, respect for each other, and for the agreed rules and laws that benefit everyone.

ECW: As a professor, diplomat and humanitarian, you know education’s transformative power. Today, with crises escalating, funding contracting and priorities competing, why must public and private donors see education as a life-saving intervention, not a secondary need? What are the consequences if we fail to sustain funding through multilateral funds like Education Cannot Wait, especially for crisis-affected children in the hardest-hit contexts?

Tom Fletcher: We know that education stabilizes communities, protects children and plants the seeds of peace. Without it, we don’t just skip lessons – we lose generations. It is the deepest tragedy that in a place like Gaza, some 658,000 school-aged children are without formal education because nine out of 10 of their schools are damaged or destroyed by the war. Without a school to go to, these children are more vulnerable, their human rights are undermined, and their futures hang in the balance.

But we are also facing a brutal funding crunch and we are reimagining the entire humanitarian enterprise. At the heart of this humanitarian reset will be three simple ideas: we will be smaller, closer to those we serve and robust in the protection of civilians. Education is one of our most powerful tools in this endeavour, and multilateral funds like Education Cannot Wait – thanks to the vision, courage, tenacity and leadership of Sarah and Gordon Brown, the latter also ECW’s founder – give us the means to deliver hope. Failing to fund education means we don’t just turn our backs on children, but we risk perpetuating the very cycles of poverty and instability we claim to fight.

ECW: The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UN-OCHA) drives global efforts to respond to humanitarian crises in Sudan, Ukraine, Gaza and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, among others. Why is education crucial in humanitarian crises, and how does it foster peace, security and economic development for all?

Tom Fletcher: In conflict-affected countries, one in three children – approximately 103 million children – are out of school, which is three times the global rate (Save the Children analysis 27 Dec 2024). Addressing this educational gap is essential: Education promotes understanding and helps young people turn away from the pull of extremist ideologies. In the long run, education drives economic progress by giving girls and boys the tools to build their own futures. That is why, even amidst a war, the classroom can be the most powerful place – a space where children can rediscover hope, dignity and purpose.

In every humanitarian crisis I’ve seen, once people find safety, education is among the first services they seek. It’s where healing begins. It’s where recovery takes root. Education is the antidote to despair and division because it teaches young people how to reclaim their place in the world.

ECW: UN-OCHA plays a key role in support of ECW investments in education in emergencies and protracted crises through its humanitarian coordination system which, alongside UNHCR’s refugee coordination role, is essential to the efficient, effective delivery of quality education in crises. Why are the UN-OCHA and UNHCR coordination systems crucial, and how can they be further strengthened?

Tom Fletcher: Coordination isn’t a bureaucratic nicety – it’s how we save more lives with the resources we have. Alongside UNHCR and our many partners, we form the backbone of a coordinated humanitarian response – to support our frontline colleagues’ efforts to reach people in their hour of greatest need. But we can and must do better. This means handing over decision-making power to partners on the ground who know their communities best, streamlining processes to reduce duplication and investing in local capacity. Our mantra must be: Local where possible and international only when necessary. That’s how we can ensure that education in emergencies arrives quickly in a way that truly meets the needs of the communities we serve.

ECW: We all know that ‘readers are leaders’ and that reading skills are key to every child’s education. What are three books that have most influenced you personally and/or professionally?

Tom Fletcher:
“Ministry of the Future” by Kim Stanley Robinson
“Silk Roads” by Peter Frankopan
“Team of Rivals” by Doris Kearns Goodwin

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By Yasmine Sherif
NEW YORK, Apr 24 2025 (IPS-Partners)

There is a global digital divide, threatening to leave entire generations of women and girls behind. Today, we place them at the centre of our shared massive action as we commemorate International Girls in ICT Day. Today, we reaffirm our commitment to harness the transformative power of education and provide these girls with the training, skills and resources they need to be part of the digital revolution that is shaping our planet. Today, we must recommit to financing their education.

The digital divide is nowhere more pronounced than on the frontlines of armed conflict, climate change and forced displacement. “Globally, there are 244 million fewer women than men using the internet, limiting access to education, job opportunities and innovation,” according to UNESCO. In Africa, for instance, “cultural barriers, cost and mobility restrictions prevent many girls from accessing technology and digital learning.”

In fact, in sub-Saharan Africa, for every 100 men that know how to use a spreadsheet, there are only 40 women with the same skills. Some recent analysis from UNICEF indicates that 90% of adolescent girls and young women are offline. That’s 9 out of 10 denied access to the limitless information and opportunities that the internet provides.

Despite these challenges, we know that access to education in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) can have a profound impact.

I think of the brave girls and teachers of the Afghan Girls’ Robotics Team. These real-life Rule Breakers – led by Education Cannot Wait’s Global Champion Somaya Faruqi – competed in robotics competitions worldwide. Through their brave acts, they learned to build and program robots, they acquired new skills in engineering and technology, and they served as ambassadors for girls in science and technology everywhere. These are the pioneers that will break through the glass ceiling and pave the way for millions of girls worldwide to access the internet and find careers in technology.

There is a strong economic case to support girls’ access to information and communication technology. According to UNESCO, we could boost global GDP by €600 billion by 2027 if we doubled the share of women in the tech workforce.

To get there, we are going to need to break some rules. That means using our wealth in the North to share with the girls of Afghanistan – and across Asia, Africa, the Middle East and Latin America – and empower them to embrace technology for girls of all ages.

We must accelerate funding to ensure children caught in humanitarian emergencies, just like Somaya Faruqi, can triumph again and again, thanks to their access to education and technology. Despite the seemingly impossible odds, they have proven that girls can stand up, learn technology and win the sprint – not just nationally or regionally, but also globally.

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Excerpt:

The ruins of a residential building in northern Gaza following an Israeli airstrike. Credit: UNICEF/Mohammed Nateel

By Yasmine Sherif
NEW YORK, Apr 21 2025 (IPS-Partners)

Creativity and innovation are essential to finding extraordinary solutions to abnormal problems. Now more than ever we must continue finding creative solutions to protect the world’s most vulnerable children from the excruciating pain of war, dispossession and destruction of their last hope: a quality education. The current humanitarian and development funding levels are falling. However, with creativity we can prevent further deterioration and instead turn towards an upward direction.

With bold, innovative action and connected problem-solving in a world of abundance we can better connect the dots between donors, governments, the private sector, UN agencies, civil society and other key partners to unleash our wealth of humanity towards those in unwanted scarcity: the world’s most vulnerable children whose only wealth is their hope for a quality education.

In 1543, Nicolaus Copernicus published his groundbreaking theory, “On the Revolutions of Heavenly Spheres.” His new ideas sparked a revolution by placing the Sun – rather than the Earth – at the centre of our solar system.

We need a Copernican Revolution of our own today – one guided by data, evidence, creativity and innovation, and the highest of all values: empathy. We can then deliver on the reforms envisioned in the UN80 Initiative, Pact for the Future and other initiatives designed to reimagine the delivery of humanitarian aid. In short, we must place children at the center of our universe and use education as our single most powerful instrument to tap their vast potential. Only then can their hope turn into reality.

Education Cannot Wait (ECW), the global fund for education in emergencies and protracted crises in the United Nations, is embracing evidence-driven reforms to streamline our operations and ensure every donor dollar creates a positive impact on the lives of children caught on the frontlines of conflict, climate change and forced displacement. With the lowest overhead costs, we are lean, agile and fast-acting, and we place children and adolescents in emergencies and protracted crises at the center of everything we do.

Our work – and our value proposition – is driven by data and evidence to achieve optimal results and impact. Let’s start with the growing needs. When ECW became operational in 2017, it was estimated that approximately 75 million crisis-affected children needed education support. Today, with violent conflicts in places like the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Gaza, Sudan and Ukraine, horrific shocks from climate change-related natural disasters, and a unprecedented rise in human displacement and migration, that number has skyrocketed to nearly a quarter of a billion – 234 million to be precise.

Data also tell us that a lack of quality education – especially across the Global South – is costing us trillions of dollars in lost opportunities every year. “Limited educational opportunities and barriers for girls cost the world economy between US$15 trillion and US$30 trillion. In nine countries, the cost of out-of-school children was estimated to be greater than the value of an entire year of GDP growth,” according to the World Bank.

Additionally, investing US$1 in early childhood education can generate returns as high as US$17 for the most disadvantaged children worldwide. Imagine the impact every dollar could have in creating a million more opportunities for the world’s most vulnerable children.

Given the current funding environment, we must embrace our creative problem-solving and solutions orientation. Besides revisiting budgets and finding human-centred solutions to those left furthest behind, another creative approach toward resource mobilization comes from impact investments. Through partnerships with visionary businesses like Swiss Cantonal Banks and Tribe Impact Capital LLP, Education Cannot Wait is able to connect private capital with public goods as a driving force toward long-term economic growth, resilience and security. With the ability to crowd-in resources and expertise, pool funds and broker partnerships, ECW is igniting global reform to deliver on a development sector, such as education, in humanitarian crises with coordination, speed and impact.

Together with our strategic donor partners, ECW is reimagining the way we deliver life-saving education supports on the frontlines of the world’s most severe humanitarian crises. One thing is certain, by following Copernicus’ evidence-based vision – and placing children at the center of our collective efforts – we can make the seemingly impossible possible – provided that we all do our part keeping our eyes on what really matters: those left furthest behind and every child’s right to a quality education – especially when this is their very last hope. By transforming their lives through a quality education, we empower them to arise from their suffering and become creative and innovative contributors to their society and, indeed, all of humanity.

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Excerpt:

By Yasmine Sherif
NEW YORK, Apr 7 2025 (IPS-Partners)

Education is an essential investment in providing health to those left furthest behind.

On World Health Day, we must connect the dots between education and health in humanitarian crisis settings. A child attending school gets vaccinations and healthcare, a nutritious meal and mental health and psychosocial services. By funding education, we optimize our investments to cover multiple sectors in one investment, such as health.

“The link between education, health and well-being is clear. Education develops the skills, values and attitudes that enable learners to lead healthy and fulfilled lives, make informed decisions and engage in positive relationships with everyone around them,” according to UNESCO.

At the same time, poor health, hunger, war-trauma and diseases negatively impact academic performance, especially in humanitarian emergencies.

According to UNICEF, humanitarian investments in education and health have substantial returns. Every $1 invested in children and their well-being yields a ten-fold societal return.

Education Cannot Wait (ECW) and our strategic partners deliver speedy and lifesaving quality education on the frontlines of the world’s most severe humanitarian crises. In places like Sudan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ethiopia, Haiti and Cameroon, this means healthy school meals, greater nutrition, safe classrooms and access to public health initiatives that are available at the beginning of school.

Right now, we are making impossible decisions on humanitarian funding that put millions of lives at risk. The most effective way of utilizing financial means is to ensure multiple impact or a holistic and cross-sectoral approach.

Education is one of the single best investments we can make, while also ensuring healthy lives for all. Not the least for the 234 million children and adolescents who today endure unspeakable crises with no other hope than to attend school, survive and thrive. This is what it is all about: the humanitarian imperative is about saving their lives.

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Excerpt:

CIVICUS speaks with Daniel Simons, Senior Legal Counsel Strategic Defence for Greenpeace International, about the lawsuit brought by an oil and gas company against Greenpeace and its broader implications for civil society. Greenpeace is a global network of environmental organisations campaigning on issues such as climate change, disarmament, forests, organic farming and peace.

Daniel Simons

What prompted Energy Transfer to take legal action against Greenpeace?

The route of the Dakota Access Pipeline crosses underneath the Missouri River a short distance from the reservation of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe. In April 2016, tribal members set up prayer encampments to express their opposition to the construction. They worried that sites of cultural importance would be damaged, and that the pipeline might contaminate the river, the Tribe’s water source.

Energy Transfer took a number of provocative actions. It sued the Tribe’s chairperson and other participants in the Indigenous resistance, and not long after, bulldozed an area less than 24 hours after the Tribe had filed a declaration in court stating there were burial grounds and resources of cultural significance in the area. These events coincided with a huge growth in attention for and attendance at the camp.

Energy Transfer alleges that the Greenpeace defendants were somehow the masterminds, coming in and secretly organising everything that happened during the Standing Rock protests, and that this included trespassing, property damage and creating public nuisance. The company also accuses the Greenpeace defendants of defamation, complaining about nine statements in particular. Additionally, Energy Transfer claims Greenpeace’s actions delayed the refinancing of the pipeline’s construction loan, causing financial harm to the company.

What was Greenpeace’s actual involvement in the protests and its relationship with Indigenous communities?

Greenpeace – including Greenpeace Inc and Greenpeace Fund, both based in the USA, and Greenpeace International, a Dutch foundation – played only a limited role in the protests. Greenpeace Inc had some connections to the Indigenous communities at Standing Rock; as I understand it, the relationship was respectful but not extensive.

Greenpeace Inc supported the protests by funding five trainers from an independent Indigenous network to provide training on non-violent direct action for two weeks, conducting supply drives for the camps, providing short-term staff mainly to help with preparing the camp for winter and donating some lock boxes that protesters could use to form a human chain, although no evidence suggests they were ever used. It also published articles and co-signed two letters to banks containing the nine statements Energy Transfer now claims are defamatory. These statements had already been widely reported by media and United Nations bodies before Greenpeace’s involvement.

According to an Indigenous activist who testified in court, Greenpeace Inc was present but followed the lead of people on the ground. Its involvement was so minimal that most tribal nations at Standing Rock wouldn’t even have been aware of it. The activist described claims that Greenpeace controlled the resistance as ‘paternalistic’ and emphasised that many Indigenous leaders had the ability to run a complex movement and engage with media themselves.

Greenpeace International’s only relevant action was signing an open letter led by the Dutch civil society organisation BankTrack, alongside 500 other organisations. Meanwhile, Greenpeace Fund had no involvement in the Standing Rock resistance, yet Energy Transfer argues that sharing resources such as office space and contact details with Greenpeace Inc makes it liable.

How is Greenpeace defending itself and what impact has the lawsuit had on its operations?

We argue that Energy Transfer has greatly exaggerated our role in the protests and is attempting to recover costs that are all unrelated to our actions. There is just no evidence of any link between the Greenpeace defendants’ activities and the damages the company claims. And there is certainly no link to any act of violence or property damage.

Greenpeace International has also taken legal action in the Netherlands, using the new European Union anti-SLAPP directive for the first time to challenge what we view as an attempt to drain our resources and silence dissent. Defending ourselves has required significant financial and personnel resources. While Greenpeace has the capacity to fight back, there are concerns that such lawsuits could deter smaller or less experienced organisations from challenging the powerful US oil and gas industry – which appears to be one of the goals of this case.

What are the next steps in the legal proceedings and how do you see this case resolving?

While the jury has reached a verdict that decided the Greenpeace defendants must pay US$666 million for defamation and the other claims, the judge still needs to enter a final judgment. There are obvious issues with jury verdict and we are in the process of challenging those. Greenpeace Inc and Greenpeace Fund have already announced they will appeal to the North Dakota Supreme Court. Meanwhile, Greenpeace International is pursuing its case against Energy Transfer in the District Court of Amsterdam, with the first procedural hearing scheduled for 2 July.

The battle is far from over. Greenpeace is determined to defeat these claims and hold Energy Transfer accountable for filing repeated SLAPP suits. This fight extends beyond Greenpeace – it concerns the protection of freedom of expression. An attack on one is an attack on all, and we hope civil society will stand with us.

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SEE ALSO
Italy: ‘Authoritarian tendencies manifest themselves in efforts to control information and stifle dissent’ CIVICUS Lens | Interview with Ilaria Masinara 22.Jun.2024
Europe: ‘Members states must introduce national anti-SLAPP legislation to protect public watchdogs’ CIVICUS Lens | Interview with Francesca Borg Constanzi 21.Mar.2024
How SLAPPs undermine democracy: a case study of the USA CIVICUS 02.Jul.2018

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By External Source
Apr 3 2025 (IPS-Partners)

 
Sigrid Kaag is the new Chair of Education Cannot Wait’s High-Level Steering Group. Kaag brings a wealth of experience in political, humanitarian and development affairs, as well as in diplomacy. In 2025, she was appointed by United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres as the UN Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process, a.i. Kaag has just concluded her mandate as Senior Humanitarian and Reconstruction Coordinator for Gaza, a role she held since 2024. She served as the first Deputy Prime Minister and first female Minister of Finance in the Dutch government starting in January 2022. Prior to this, she was Dutch Minister for Trade and Development Cooperation from October 2017 until May 2021, and Minister for Foreign Affairs until September 2021.

Kaag has held a wide range of senior positions in the United Nations system. From 2015 to 2017, she was the United Nations Special Coordinator for Lebanon, and from 2013 to 2015, she was Special Coordinator of the Joint Organization for Prohibition of Chemical Weapons and the United Nations Mission in Syria. She served as Assistant Secretary-General with the United Nations Development Programme from 2010 to 2013 and as Regional Director for the Middle East and North Africa with UNICEF in Jordan from 2007 to 2010. Prior to that, Kaag served in several senior positions with UNICEF, the International Organization for Migration, and the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East.

Kaag holds a Master of Arts in Middle East Studies from the University of Exeter, a Master of Philosophy in International Relations from Oxford University and a Bachelor of Arts in Middle East Studies from the American University in Cairo.

ECW: Congratulations on your appointment as the new Chair of ECW’s High-Level Steering Group. What do you hope to achieve for crisis-affected girls and boys who urgently need education support through ECW’s work with our strategic donors and partners?

Sigrid Kaag: Thank you very much. I have both observed and been a partner with Education Cannot Wait (ECW) from its early years, notably in my Ministerial roles in the Netherlands. As Chair, it is a great privilege to build upon the success which The Rt. Hon. Gordon Brown established as the founding father of ECW. I have had the honor of working alongside him for many years to champion education in emergencies and protracted crises, and to position it higher on the international agenda. ECW and its implementing partners continue to drive results that help achieve our vision of quality education for all, including the 234 million crisis-affected children and adolescents around the world who urgently need education support.

Education is often the first service to suffer when people are on the move or schools and teachers are targeted in armed conflicts. ECW fiercely advocates for the rights of all girls and boys to a safe, inclusive quality education, and it brings together the strategic complementary partners who are best placed to make true impact on the ground. Through donor financing, ECW’s funded partners work around the clock to re-establish a sense of normalcy for crisis-impacted children, and to provide the continuous, quality learning to which every child is entitled.

If you look at the state of the world today and the diverse crises that so many countries face – with children always the hardest hit – ECW is more important now than ever before. We are a proven model that funds to deliver life-saving quality education with speed, agility, depth and impact.

ECW and its partners – including donors, the private sector, ministries of education, UN agencies, civil society, and local communities – have consistently demonstrated that it is possible to create meaningful change and have a significant impact in the lives of crisis-affected children through education when we have the funding needed to do it together.

ECW: We are experiencing a fast-changing humanitarian funding landscape resulting in the first drop in humanitarian funding for education in over a decade. Why is investing in education for children impacted by armed conflicts, climate change and forced displacement essential in global efforts to build peace, security and economic growth?

Sigrid Kaag: To ask the question is to answer it. It’s an issue of human rights, opportunity, emancipation and development. Learning is a continuous journey in a person’s lifetime under normal circumstances. Children and adolescents who are impacted by armed conflicts, climate change and forced displacement are often deprived of this opportunity and of the support circles that would enable them to grow and flourish into young adults, equipped to chart their destinies. Education in crises is nothing less than lifesaving and must be a priority for humanitarian funding. Along with food, healthcare and shelter, education is critical in creating a systems-wide approach that protects and safeguards children and builds toward lasting solutions. Funding education programmes targeted for crisis-affected girls and boys – alongside mental health and psychosocial support – is both foundational and fundamental.

When children are denied access to education, not only are their future opportunities limited, but socio-economic disparities are perpetuated, fueling armed conflicts, forced displacement and environmental degradation. Providing education opportunities offers those left furthest behind a pathway to resilience, helping them adapt to the challenges posed by these crises and empowering them to create positive change in their societies.

Education in crisis contexts is also a fundamental tool for promoting peace and security. Schools offer safe spaces, reducing children’s vulnerability to forced recruitment into armed groups, exploitation and violence. Educating children in these settings fosters a sense of hope and stability, allowing young people to envision a future beyond their immediate circumstances, and promoting peacebuilding efforts within and across borders.

Finally, investing in education is key to fostering economic growth, which is important even amidst crisis and is crucial in post-crisis recovery efforts. Education develops the next generation’s skills and potential, which is vital for rebuilding economies and strengthening societies. Without these investments, the long-term prospects for economic recovery remain bleak, as an uneducated population will struggle to meet the challenges of a rapidly changing global economy. Education, in this context, is not just a humanitarian issue but also a strategic investment for sustainable peace and development.

ECW: As the new Chair of ECW’s High-Level Steering Group, what is your message to donor governments and the private sector regarding their role in ensuring that crisis-impacted children receive the education they deserve? How can they step up and fulfill their commitments to achieve ECW’s goal of reaching 20 million children?

Sigrid Kaag: Support for Education Cannot Wait is an investment in stability, opportunity and human dignity in the world’s most fragile places. ECW has done an incredible job, mobilizing over US$1.6 billion to date. With global needs spiraling, ECW’s funded work in places like Ukraine, Gaza, Sudan, Syria and the Democratic Republic of the Congo has never been more crucial. With its efficient operating model and low overheads, donors – whether governments, private sector or philanthropists – can look to ECW to make their money and their impact, go further. For just US$250, ECW can support a young girl or boy to stay in education for three years. That’s incredible value for money.

We need to think smartly about how to leverage new sources of funding. We need to harness the power and innovation of the private sector to co-create new solutions. For the private sector, investing in education is not just philanthropy, it is an investment in the stable, prosperous markets of tomorrow. We will also need the strong support of our government partners to prioritize education in emergencies in their aid budgets.

We are at a critical juncture, and the time to act is now.

ECW: You are a visionary leader for girls’ education and for mental health and psychosocial support (MHPSS), particularly for crisis-affected children and adolescents. These are two key priorities for ECW. Why should we invest in the education of girls today to build a better tomorrow? Why is MHPSS crucial in the holistic education approach for crisis-affected children?

Sigrid Kaag: Investing in girls’ education should no longer be a question. Girls and women are half of the world’s population. I’d like to think that, in 2025, we don’t even have to answer that question anymore.

It is a no-brainer. We’ve known for a long time that investing in girls, adolescent girls and women is essential if you look at well-being, health and educational outcomes, but also the income of the family and future of the community. Education translates to economic progress. By investing in individuals, you’re also investing in a future workforce.

There’s an economic argument and there’s a rights argument. Then there is a protection and emancipation argument. They all come together. That said, sadly, there are places in our world where this argument still needs to be made, and we will continue making it. But for the partners of ECW, and certainly me as the Chair, it’s quite the reverse. Together, we champion every child’s right to a quality education and have no doubt of the value in making that investment.

In terms of the importance of MHPSS, I’ve seen the gap in this support since 2005/2006, when I was the UNICEF Regional Director in the Middle East and North Africa. Back then, MHPSS was being treated as an afterthought, as an extra activity that could be an add-on – haphazardly tagged on when we were talking about education in crisis settings. So, when I became the Dutch Minister for Trade and Development Cooperation, I made sure that we mainstreamed MHPSS in all of the crisis activities, particularly education and health. As we focus on education, it is important to underscore that MHPSS is taken along as a core activity for the teachers and those that work at the schools, the children and the parents as well. It is one way to assist crisis-impacted children to begin the journey to tackle at least part of the trauma inflicted on them in crisis settings. It is essential.

ECW: We know that ‘readers are leaders’ and that reading skills are key to every child’s education, no matter who or where they are. What are three books that have most influenced you personally and/or professionally, and why would you recommend them to others?

Sigrid Kaag: Three interesting books that I have recently read include The Map of Love by Ahdaf Soueif, Grand Hotel Europa by Ilja Leonard Pfeijffer, and The Crisis of Democratic Capitalism by Martin Wolf. Global politics is the underlying theme that threads through all three books. The historical fiction novel, The Map of Love, is about an intergenerational, cross-cultural journey that unfolds between an Egyptian and an American family. Politics and personal relationships become intertwined as both the ancestors and their descendants embark on their journeys. Grand Hotel Europa is also historical fiction and follows a writer who stays in the once glorious but now decaying Grand Hotel Europa. The story of the hotel and the memorable hotel guests serve as a metaphor for globalization and the European condition. The Crisis of Democratic Capitalism points out that democratic capitalism, despite its flaws, remains the best choice for retaining our political and economic freedom. Each of these books invite the reader to take a step back, examine the bigger picture of our well-being as a world, and consider how we are all connected to each other as global citizens.

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By Yasmine Sherif
NEW YORK, Mar 13 2025 (IPS-Partners)

Millions of children worldwide are going hungry, and we all know that hungry children cannot learn. On International School Meals Day, we are calling on donors to significantly scale-up funding for school feeding to ensure every child can go to school, every child can access at least one nutritious meal a day, and every child can concentrate, develop and achieve.

Our investment in school meals saves lives through education in emergencies. It also offers significant economic returns that pave the way for strong economies and increased global security. In fact, according to the World Food Programme (WFP) State of School Feeding Worldwide Report, every dollar invested in school meals has a $9 return. These returns cut across numerous sectors, including agriculture, education, health and nutrition, and social protection.

The benefits for learners are significant. According to WFP: “Every day, over 100 million children in low- and lower-middle-income countries are going hungry. Millions go to school on an empty stomach – hunger affects their concentration and ability to learn. There are also millions – particularly girls – who simply do not go to school because their families need them to help in the fields or perform domestic duties. In conflict-affected countries, children are twice as likely to be out of school than their peers in stable countries – 2.5 times more likely, in the case of girls.”

Investing in healthy school meals – especially in crisis contexts – is an investment in local economies and an investment in local human capital. It’s an investment in the future engineers, teachers and technicians that will drive positive change to end repeated cycles of hunger, displacement and poverty.

Working together with partners, ECW provides significant investments each year in school feeding. The most recent analysis indicates that ECW investments for quality school feeding interventions active in 2023 reached over 300,000 children across nine countries.

In Ethiopia, ECW investments reached around 100,000 children through school feeding programmes. Recognizing that poverty was a crucial factor keeping children out of school, the programme involved families and community members to manage the programme and provide in-kind contributions like building kitchen houses or providing firewood to cook the hot meals.

In Cameroon and Haiti, ECW funding delivered by WFP is focused on local procurement from smallholder farmers. This not only ensures nutritious meals for young learners, but also strengthens the local food system and local economy.

In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, over 39,000 students in 69 schools have received nutritious meals through an ECW-funded programme delivered by UNICEF.

The needs are skyrocketing. With ongoing conflicts in places like the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Sudan creating ripple effects across Africa – and indeed across the globe – we must ensure that school meals in education investments remain at the top of the international humanitarian funding agenda.

ECW connects across various sectors to accelerate the collective impact of humanitarian funding. Together, we can keep hope alive for the 234 million crisis-impacted children that urgently need our support.

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Excerpt:

As the Captain of the Afghan Dreamers, Education Cannot Wait Global Champion Somaya Faruqi led the team to victory at robotics competitions around the world, built a ventilator out of car parts, and eventually fled the country. Today she continues her bold advocacy to ensure education for all of Afghanistan’s children.

By External Source
NEW YORK, Mar 7 2025 (IPS-Partners)

Angel Studios’ new feature film ‘Rule Breakers’ – launching in theaters across the United States, Canada, South Africa and Sri Lanka today – highlights the hope, courage and resilience of the Afghan Girls Robotics Team.

The film charts the inspiring journey of the team, known as the Afghan Dreamers (trailer available here). When their innovation draws global attention, their success sparks hope – and opposition. As threats loom and sacrifices are made, their courage and unity ignite a movement that could forever transform the world.

It’s a harrowing tale and a clarion call to return Afghanistan’s girls to the safety and hope of a quality education.

“On International Women’s Day, we are joining nations around the world to call for the end of the cruel and destructive ban on girls’ secondary education. It is time to rebuild Afghanistan based on the vast potential of her most precious natural resource: the resilient and strong Afghan girls and boys. Keep alive their hope through education and let them develop and be productive for the country,” said Yasmine Sherif, Education Cannot Wait (ECW), the global fund for education in emergencies and protracted crises in the United Nations.

The real-life Captain of the Afghan Dreamers Somaya Faruqi is now studying mechanical engineering in the US and continues her advocacy for girls’ education in Afghanistan as an Education Cannot Wait Global Champion.

“‘Rule Breakers’ provides the world a glimpse at the reality facing millions of Afghan girls and women today who are living under Taliban rule. They are being denied their human rights to education, their freedom and their dignity. Our voices will not be silenced,” Faruqi said.

Directed by Oscar-winner Bill Guttentag, the film stars Ali Fazal and Nikohl Boosheri. The supporting cast includes Noorin Gulamgaus, Amber Afzalzi, Nina Hosseinzaheh, Sara Rowe and Miriam Siraj.

“The story of ‘Rule Breakers’ is more than just a film – it’s a testament to the power of education, technology and resilience. The Afghan Girls Robotics Team’s journey represents the courage of young women who refuse to accept limitations placed upon them, using science and innovation as their tools of resistance,” said Elaha Mahboob, Writer and Executive Producer of ‘Rule Breakers’. “As someone who has worked to create opportunities for Afghan women in technology, I wanted to bring this story to life to inspire the next generation of changemakers and to show the world what is possible when young women are given access to education and opportunity.”

On 17 September 2021, the Taliban banned secondary education for girls in Afghanistan. Today, approximately 2.5 million Afghan girls are out of school, according to UNESCO. Access to primary school has also fallen sharply since the Taliban takeover, with approximately 1.1 million fewer girls and boys attending school today.

Education Cannot Wait along with its global partners continue to provide community-based education for both girls and boys in Afghanistan. With over US$88 million invested to date, the programmes are delivered on the ground through local partners, and have reached over 229,000 children, 52% of whom are girls.

With the support of leading global advocates, ECW launched its #AfghanGirlsVoices Campaign in 2023. Since its launch, the campaign has reached over 180 million people and rallied support from more than 50 global leaders including best-selling authors, artists, grassroots organizations and more. Join ECW today by sharing your support for #RuleBreakers, #AfghanGirlsVoices or making an individual donation.

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A scene from Rule Breakers, a dramatization of the story of the Afghan Girls Robotics Team.

By Joyce Chimbi and Naureen Hossain
Mar 7 2025 (IPS)

Like the Afghan robotics team, Education Cannot Wait (ECW), the global fund for education in emergencies and protracted crises in the United Nations, is breaking the ‘rules’ and continuing to educate young women in that country despite an edict from the Taliban denying girls a secondary school education.

ECW’s Yasmine Sherif, the Executive Director of Education Cannot Wait, tore up a piece of paper as a symbolic representation of the Taliban edict, which she said violated international law and meant that 1.5 million girls were excluded from education. She was speaking at an International Women’s Day press conference at the United Nations.

The film Rule Breakers, and the Afghan Robotics Team it is based on, shows that “you can do anything. So for whatever we hear right now around us and see around the world, ‘We don’t have money. We can’t do this.’ We are saying—watch Rule Breakers. Create a new path.”

Rule Breakers is a dramatic feature film that follows the story of young Afghan women who have broken tradition and stereotypes to pursue their dreams in science and technology. The film, which was released today, ahead of International Women’s Day, is based on the true story of an all-girl robotics team, born and raised in Afghanistan, and the woman who taught them to dream.

ECW, with their partners, was also breaking the ‘rules’ made by the Taliban and had invested USD 30 million in a multi-year, community-based program that is supported by international partners in the most underserved areas.

“Sixty-five percent of those who are receiving education are girls and adolescent girls, so we are breaking the ban. We are breaking the rules because you have to do so if you want to do what is right in this particular context. So we have reached over 100,000 children, and as I said, 65 percent are adolescent girls,” Sherif said.

She encouraged funders to join in the rule-breaking in a climate where funding was scarce.

Yasmine Sherif, the Executive Director of Education Cannot Wait, addresses a press conference at the United Nations.

“There are rule breakers everywhere that believe that you still have to help the world. And I’m saying, please help us. Help the Afghan girls to get their education, because I’m sure that everyone agrees that this is a fantastic way of doing something.”

The movie, a harrowing tale and a clarion call to return Afghanistan’s girls to the safety and hope of a quality education, releases today in the United States, Canada, South Africa and Sri Lanka, and Sherif says the world should use International Women’s Day to push for the ending of the ban on girls’ secondary education in Afghanistan.

“On International Women’s Day, we are joining nations around the world to call for the end of the cruel and destructive ban on girls’ secondary education. It is time to rebuild Afghanistan based on the vast potential of her most precious natural resource: the resilient and strong Afghan girls and boys. Keep alive their hope through education and let them develop and be productive for the country,” says Sherif.

Rule Breakers is a PG-rated, family-friendly film—directed by Oscar-winner Bill Guttentag—that highlights the unique transformative power of education and raises awareness about the crucial importance of the right to education for girls in Afghanistan, in other crises and emergency settings globally, and the importance of Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM) education for all girls around the world.

Elaha Mahboob, co-producer and writer of Rule Breakers, addresses a press conference at the United Nations.

Elaha Mahboob, co-producer and writer of Rule Breakers, told the press conference that the film brought out nuances in Afghan women’s lives that are not often considered.

“Usually when we talk about Afghan girls and Afghan women, it is either around tragedy or we see an Afghan woman as merely a victim of conflict. Which is, you know, part of the story, but it is not the full picture or full story of what life has been like for women, or what life has been like in the past twenty years in Afghanistan,” Mahboob said.

Yasmine Sherif (left), Elaha Mahboob (center), and Roya Mahboob (right). Roya Mahboob is a tech entrepreneur who established the non-profit Digital Citizen Fund, which founded the Afghan girls’ robotics team, whom the movie is about. Credit: Naureen Hossain/IPS

“For me, it was really important we show a side of Afghanistan that we have never seen in the media or any movies. That there was progress; there were so many courageous women and men that were trying to build a future in Afghanistan. And even though you will see in the movie that there were so many [societal] challenges, like expectations and limitations for these girls, they didn’t sit back and they never gave up on their dreams. They were actually actively working toward their dreams.”

Set in Afghanistan, where learning for young women is often considered rebellion, Rule Breakers brings to life the incredible story of the Afghan Girls Robotics Team, showcasing the resilience of girls in STEM and, more so, that ambitious young girls and women in crises and emergency situations should neither be forgotten nor left behind in their pursuit of STEM. It is a story of courage, resilience, and the power of education that, importantly, seeks to inspire and keep the dream of an education alive for all children everywhere.

The Afghan Girls Robotics Team, also known as the “Afghan Dreamers,” was founded in 2017 by Roya Mahboob, a young woman from Herat, Afghanistan, who became a leading force in the country for STEM education for girls. These girls were told their dreams were impossible and that there was no place for women and girls in science, technology, and innovation.

The young women dared to dream and refused to be silenced. Overcoming staggering obstacles, Roya and her team trained in engineering and robotics and traveled the world to compete in international high school robotics competitions.

Rule Breakers is opening at cinemas in the United States, Canada, South Africa and Sri Lanka today.

As a sign of things to come, during the COVID-19 pandemic and under enormous difficulties, they successfully built a ventilator in three months. Somaya Faruqi, portrayed as Tara in the film, was the former captain of the team. Only 19 years old at the time of the Taliban takeover in 2021, Faruqi’s dream to become a mechanical engineer was already taking shape.

Now an engineering scholarship student in the United States, Faruqi is also an Education Cannot Wait (ECW) Global Champion, spearheading the launch of ECW’s global advocacy campaign—#AfghanGirlsVoices.

“Rule Breakers provides the world a glimpse at the reality facing millions of Afghan girls and women today who are living under Taliban rule. They are being denied their human rights to education, their freedom and their dignity. Our voices will not be silenced,” Faruqi said.

The #AfghanGirlsVoices campaign uses moving illustrations by a young Afghan female artist and determined testimonies from Afghan girls to amplify the voices of those left behind demanding their right to education. As the global fund for education in emergencies and protracted crises, ECW supports and protects holistic learning outcomes.

The film stars Ali Fazal and Nikohl Boosheri. The supporting cast includes Noorin Gulamgaus, Amber Afzalzi, Nina Hosseinzaheh, Sara Rowe and Miriam Siraj.

“The story of ‘Rule Breakers’ is more than just a film—it’s a testament to the power of education, technology and resilience. The Afghan Girls Robotics Team’s journey represents the courage of young women who refuse to accept limitations placed upon them, using science and innovation as their tools of resistance,” said Elaha Mahboob, Writer and Executive Producer of Rule Breakers.

“As someone who has worked to create opportunities for Afghan women in technology, I wanted to bring this story to life to inspire the next generation of changemakers and to show the world what is possible when young women are given access to education and opportunity.”

Education Cannot Wait’s #AfghanGirlsVoices campaign has reached 184 million online individuals, 4.1 billion potential audience members, and 4,100 mentions to date. Credit: ECW

The ECW works with global champions like Faruqi in its mission to ensure children affected by armed conflict, climate-induced disasters, and forced displacement can access the safety, hope, and opportunity that only a quality education can provide.

Sherif reminded funders to contribute.

“To all strategic public partners, donors, and private sectors—please, please, break the rules of your own minds and say, ‘There is money; we can do this! They are breaking the rules and bans in Afghanistan to make sure every girl gets an education irrespective of that ban.” And Education Cannot Wait is the vehicle, and we have great partners on the ground. It’s happening. It’s not what we will do—it’s happening right now.”

Around the world, a staggering 234 million children caught in crises are in dire need of support to access quality education, an estimated increase of 35 million over the past three years. Forcibly displaced children, girls and children with disabilities are among the most affected.

Three years after the de facto authorities took power, Afghanistan stands out as the only country in the world where girls and women are officially forbidden to access education beyond Grade 6. Nearly 1.4 million Afghan girls have been deliberately deprived of schooling. Access to primary education has also fallen sharply, with 1.1 million fewer girls and boys attending school.

Rule Breakers offers a powerful story for the global community to unite in support of Afghan girls and with all children affected by crises who have been left behind in the education system. It is a story of hope, resilience, strength and achievements. A story that can resonate for all these 234 million children not to be forgotten. A story that brings to life the promise of a quality education for all and the potential for every child to be pulled out of the depth of darkness and be set on a path of lifelong learning and earning opportunity.

#AfghanGirlsVoices has rallied support from 50+ global leaders and prominent voices, including bestselling authors, artists, Afghan grassroots organizations, UN and government officials, civil society organizations, human rights advocates, youth activists, and more.

IPS UN Bureau Report

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By External Source
Mar 6 2025 (IPS-Partners)

 
Dr. Ramiz Alakbarov was appointed as the UN Resident Coordinator and Humanitarian Coordinator in Ethiopia by the UN Secretary-General António Guterres in August 2023.

Prior to his current assignment, Dr. Alakbarov served as Deputy Special Representative for Afghanistan with the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan, where he was also the UN Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator.

Dr. Alakbarov has also served in several positions within the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), including as Deputy Executive Director for Management and UN Reforms (ad-interim) and Director of the Policy and Strategy Division in New York, Country Representative in Haiti, Deputy Regional Director of the Regional Office for Arab States and Head of the Office in South Sudan. Prior to these positions, he served in various roles at UNFPA supporting country programmes in Arab States, Eastern Europe and Central Asia, including as Programme Officer covering Sudan, Somalia and Iraq, and as Humanitarian Response Officer for Operations in Afghanistan, Palestine and the Great Lakes Region.

From 1992 to 1995, he was an Assistant Professor at Azerbaijan Medical University and a practicing physician. Dr. Alakbarov carries MD and PhD degrees in internal medicine from Azerbaijan Medical University and an MA in International Relations from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy in Boston, Massachusetts.

ECW: In your capacity as UN Resident Coordinator and Humanitarian Coordinator in Ethiopia, you oversee inter-agency multisectoral humanitarian and development aid in support of the Government’s efforts. Why is prioritizing education critical, particularly in areas affected by emergencies and protracted crises?

Dr. Ramiz Alakbarov: First, allow me to express appreciation to Education Cannot Wait (ECW) for making education central to everything we do in humanitarian and development settings. I have worked for the UN for over 30 years and, in every country I’ve worked, I have seen the aid community often prioritizing immediate lifesaving needs over more “development needs” – education being one of the areas of work that was paid less attention to. Since its creation in 2016, ECW has become a critical changemaker.

It is important to remember that education is a basic human right and, as such, every child, regardless of their circumstances, deserves access to quality education. It’s not just an ideal. It’s a fundamental entitlement and ensuring every child can access it is a shared responsibility.

Education is also more than just a right: it is a lifeline, especially for children affected by a crisis. In conflict and displacement settings, education provides stability, protection and a sense of normalcy amid chaos and trauma.

Education is also a critical investment in the future which has a promise of development, opportunities and prosperity. It empowers children to shape their own lives and strengthens entire communities. ECW, with its targeted focus on the most vulnerable learners, has contributed to moving the needle for children in emergency contexts, including girls and children with disabilities.

For girls, its impact is particularly profound: countless studies have shown how investing in girls’ education leads to declining rates of child marriages and reduces child mortality. It also improves the nutrition of children and family well-being.

In Ethiopia, phase one of the ECW Multi-Year Resilience Programme (MYRP)e, implemented by UNICEF and Save the Children in 2019-2024, provides a concrete example of the importance of establishing gender-sensitive protection mechanisms in schools and communities. Through establishing referral pathways in and around target schools, 2,353 children (673 girls) who had experienced violence were reached by health, social work or justice services. In addition to this, the 85 target schools established peer-to-peer learning networks among girls, female teachers and mothers to promote gender equality and awareness on the right for girls to continue their education in safe learning environments.

By prioritizing education, we are not only investing in the individual futures of these children, but also in the stability and prosperity of their communities. It’s an ethical conviction but also a very practical truth. We are all interconnected and interdependent. The well-being of one community is intrinsically linked to the well-being of others.

Investing in education creates a ripple effect that contributes to broader stability, well-being and peace. Education is the most powerful tool which gives a signal of return to normalcy, it is a tool that rebuilds and restores hope and creates lasting change. It is equally important that education covers all aspects, starting from early childhood development, and covers the needs of all children, including children with special needs.

The Government of Ethiopia established several model schools for children with different special needs in Addis Ababa, a very successful practice which needs to be further expanded to ensure that all children with such needs have access to education. The UN family in Ethiopia supports various programmes targeting children with special needs and recently joined forces with the Ministry of Women and Social Affairs to organize the 1st Africa Continental sign language conference in Addis Ababa at the end of 2024. Sign language courses and programmes have also been introduced at the Addis Ababa University. These prepare specialists and teachers, another step forward towards making education more accessible for children with special needs.

ECW: Ethiopia faces a staggering challenge, with an estimated 9 million children out of school due to compounded effects of various crises, including conflicts, climate change-induced severe droughts and floods, and displacement. How can multilateral aid donors, including Education Cannot Wait (ECW), further help address this urgent crisis? Why should more public and private sector donors get involved?

Dr. Ramiz Alakbarov: The work of Education Cannot Wait plays a pivotal role in providing education to children living in these emergencies – whether they are internally displaced due to natural disasters, returnees in the aftermath of conflict, refugees or children from host communities. All these children need access to safe, inclusive and quality educational opportunities and ECW’s investments provide the comprehensive support crucial to meeting the urgent needs on the ground.

While donors have been generous and committed to Ethiopia’s development, the reality is that the needs are much larger than the available support. In this context, emergency education continues to be the most underfunded sector, and further advocacy efforts are needed to fill the growing funding gaps. ECW is providing multi-year predictable funding free from excessive conditionality, which ensures continuity of support and is bridging the gap between humanitarian and development programming. This creates strength in the communities and is key for post-conflict transitioning and resilience in communities affected by both conflict and climate emergencies.

Lack of financial support to education only deepens humanitarian needs, creates humanitarian dependencies, and increases the future humanitarian caseload. As availability of resources is on the decline, greater emphasis on resilience-building measures, such as education, needs to be made. The aid community and donors should not underestimate the importance of investments into education – it is a key element of building resilience for the communities affected by crisis.

Since 2019, through ECW-funded interventions, UNICEF has supported access to safe and protective quality education for 194,734 children (99,017 girls) in conflict and drought-affected regions across Ethiopia – implementing responses to sudden-onset and protracted crises in 9 out the 13 Ethiopian regions. In total, through support from ECW, UNICEF and partners have trained 1,446 teachers on child-centered pedagogy, gender-based violence, disability inclusion and child protection, and responded to damaged schools and overcrowded classrooms by rehabilitating 209 classrooms and temporary learning spaces.

While continued support is essential, we must also expand our resource mobilization efforts by reaching new donors and partners. Private donors are important as they bring additional resources, innovation and fresh perspectives to the table. These contributions are critical to scaling up programmes and reaching even more children in need. The LEGO Foundation’s investments in early childhood education (ECE) in emergencies, both in Ethiopia and globally, provide a great example of how private sector donors can drive positive change for children and push for increased investment in underfunded subsectors, such as ECE. More needs to be done through bridging in elements of innovation, digital connectivity and creative expansion of access to learning for all children.

I also want to acknowledge the incredible work of humanitarian staff across Ethiopia, who are operating sometimes in extremely challenging conditions. Their dedication to the cause of education makes a profound difference in the lives of children.

Investing in education is an investment in resilience, peace, stability and long-term economic development. We need everyone’s support to give these children the education they deserve.

ECW: Having served as a senior UN official in countries with very diverse settings and in complex crisis situations – from Ethiopia to the Middle East and from South Sudan to Haiti and Afghanistan – what are your key takeaways on the importance of strengthening complementarity between humanitarian, development and peace interventions? How does ECW’s innovative approach in the education sector contribute to advancing the ‘triple nexus’?

Dr. Ramiz Alakbarov: Working for the UN in various setting for the last 31 years, I have learned that a siloed humanitarian approach is no longer a viable value proposition to respond to a natural or manmade crisis. Humanitarian, development and political actors must work together to effectively address the root causes of the challenges we face, to eliminate them and to create a quick path to recovery. Each player provides a distinct yet complementary role, and their efforts must be synchronized for maximum impact.

Education is a powerful example of the triple nexus in action. It simultaneously addresses urgent humanitarian needs – offering children safety, protection and stability – while also fostering long-term development by building human capital and skills. At the same time, it serves as a powerful tool to build peace, promote social cohesion and prevent violence.

In the new aid environment we are facing in 2025, we must aim to provide adequate support to all basic human need areas, regardless of operational context, and education here takes a central role. It must not be de-prioritized or made optional/secondary to immediate life-saving interventions. In other words, simply providing immediate relief and asking communities to wait for a durable solution is not an acceptable value proposition.

While working as a first responder to the devastating 12 January 2010 earthquake in Haiti, which reportedly took lives of more than 220,000 people in one day, I have witnessed how communities affected by the earthquake put emphasis on bringing schools back to operations as one of the first priorities. While the rubble of Port-au-Prince was under the initial phase of cleaning just weeks after the tragic earthquake, it was heartwarming to see children lining up on the streets early in the morning wearing uniforms and going to schools, which often were re-opened in makeshift tents.

One of my tasks in Haiti was to focus on restoring midwifery education. Haiti was facing an acute shortage of professional midwives and the only midwifery school in the country was destroyed by the earthquake. The school building had collapsed and taken the lives of most of the teaching personnel and the students in attendance. The UN acted quickly and classes restarted quickly – first in tents and, later, the school was fully restored through the efforts of the UN system (UNFPA, MINUSTAH and UNICEF). I was proud to be at the midwifery school graduation ceremony in September of 2014, where the survivors of the earthquake received their diplomas, and new students started their classes.

Education is also constantly prioritized by the communities affected by the crisis. On 3 July 2022, I led a memorable visit of humanitarian team members to review the earthquake relief operation in the Wori Kala Village of the Barmal District of Paktika Province in Afghanistan. In the meeting with community leaders, where only one person spoke English, I was handed over a handwritten list of the community needs. There was no surprise, education was listed as a top priority. In my conversation with community leaders, I asked them why education was a priority while they still struggle with access to basic needs such as water and food?

The answer was immediate and clear: “…Almost no one in the village has education and, because of this, we live in poverty. If we have education, we will have hope for the future and that is why we need it most.”

ECW’s innovative, multi-stakeholder approach ensures that funding and programming go beyond short-term emergency relief, integrating long-term sustainability and resilience-building.

The ECW MYRP, operating in Ethiopia since 2019 and now in its second phase, highlights how ECW contributes to strengthening resilience in target communities, while also strengthening the EiE structure on national and subnational levels.

In this regard, the strengthening of the Education Cluster in Ethiopia, co-led by UNICEF and Save the Children, is exemplified with the increase in active cluster partners from 6 in 2021 to 102 in 2024, resulting in timely and quality data management. This data supports ECW and other actors to produce high-quality, evidence-based advocacy products for their national and global advocacy. In a context where EiE needs tripled since 2019, ECW have provided a platform for the Cluster to advocate with donors such as Finland, LEGO Foundation, Norway, the EU, Canada and the UK, resulting in increased support for lifesaving EiE interventions.

However, as mentioned earlier, today’s reality remains that humanitarian needs across the globe are large and, despite the generosity of donors, availability of resources is in decline.

We must leverage innovative financing, invest in locally-led solutions and strengthen cross-sectoral collaboration to drive sustainable, long-term change. We also must make sure that all our support leads to sustainability, durable solutions and lasting change.

ECW: We know that ‘readers are leaders’ and that reading skills are key to every child’s education, no matter who or where they are. What are three books that have most influenced you personally and/or professionally, and why would you recommend them to others?

Dr. Ramiz Alakbarov: Reading serves as a gateway to knowledge, fostering critical thinking and understanding of complex ideas and diverse perspectives. Ensuring every child has access to books and the opportunity to read is vital. Even in the age of AI, books will remain indispensable, retaining their timeless value.

On my own personal and leadership journey, a great variety of books shaped my identity, guided my choices, and inspired me to live a purposeful and meaningful life. Choosing just three is not easy but, for the purpose of this interview, I selected the following three:

A Path out of Poverty by Paul Farmer. This book was written by the late Professor Paul Farmer with whom I had the honor and privilege to work in Haiti on public health matters and establishing Haiti’s largest private-public partnership University Hospital in Mirabalais. Dr. Farmer was a strong advocate for building capacities of national institutions and authored “accompaniment approach” to the nationally owned initiatives. His book makes a strong evidence-based case that development best works through nationally owned processes. It is an excellent read for aid practitioners and those interested in the sector.

The Commanding Heights by Daniel Yergin and Joseph Stanislaw was originally published in 1998 and, in 2002, a 6-hour PBS documentary was produced based on that book. I would highly recommend this book or documentary to anyone who works in international development and wants to reexamine how the evolution of economic theories and world politics intertwined to create the current global peace, humanitarian and development landscape.

Defiant Dreams: The Journey of an Afghan Girl Who Risked Everything for Education, written by Sola Mahfouz and Malaina Kapoor in 2023 is my third book. As someone who lived and worked in Afghanistan through the most tumultuous times of its recent history (2020–2023), I find this book to be a must read. It is a fascinating, dramatic and inspiring book which gives hope that we all will see a better future for Afghanistan. Women and girls of Afghanistan will not be silenced; they stand up for their rights, they see education as a path to the future and they will win.

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By Yasmine Sherif
NEW YORK, Feb 20 2025 (IPS-Partners)

The central theme of this year’s World Day of Social Justice is to “strengthen a just transition for a sustainable future.” Education is the very foundation for achieving social justice. Without an education we cannot end extreme poverty and advance economic growth. Without an education we cannot empower young girls to become teachers, doctors, nurses, lawyers, engineers, let alone financially self-reliant. Without an education we cannot achieve good governance, the rule of law and peaceful co-existence.

Social justice in all its forms requires education, be it formal education through grade 12, onto tertiary education, or vocational skills training. There is simply no other way. Education is the path to social justice. As a global community, we are all interconnected and it is thus in our interest to ensure that children worldwide benefit from an education. However, nearly a quarter of a billion children living on the frontlines of the world’s most devastating humanitarian crises do not access a quality education. This will not bode well for them, nor for us.

This global education crisis will have vast impacts on our global society, and our quest for social justice. I think of the brave women of the Afghan Girls Robotics Team, including our own ECW Global Champion Somaya Faruqi, who broke gender norms on their quest to learn more about science, technology, engineering and math. Coming out next month, their story will be told in the inspiring movie Rule Breakers. But, much more needs to be done. Social justice does not exist for the women and girls of Afghanistan today, nor in many other parts of the world torn apart by brutal conflicts, forced displacement, climate change or oppressive societal norms.

Since ECW was founded just a few years ago, this global fund for education in emergencies and protracted crises, together with all our strategic donor partners and implementing partners, have reached a total of 11.4 million children with quality education. With increased funding support, we can provide millions more with access to quality education, and contribute to social justice.

The provision of a quality education fit for the 21st Century is the single best investment we can make to empower children and youth, create stronger economies, and ensure a peaceful co-existence in the world. There is no other promise, and no other pathway that can substitute education as the safest road to social justice.

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By Yasmine Sherif
NEW YORK, Feb 11 2025 (IPS-Partners)

A global alert is not an option. It requires global action. Over the past three years, the number of crisis-impacted school-aged children in need of urgent quality education support has grown by an alarming 35 million, according to Education Cannot Wait’s new Global Estimates Report.

The recently published report offers a stark and brutal alert for the future of 234 million girls and boys enduring the frontlines of the world’s most dire humanitarian crises. Their access to a quality education is non-existent. We cannot stand by and let the consequences avalanche into a total collapse. They desperately need our urgent collective global action, now.

The complex and horrific disruption of education in Gaza, the Eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo, Sudan, Ukraine and beyond are utterly dangerous and harmful to them and all of us. Without action, we are pushing even more children into harm’s way. Without a quality education, we risk repeating cycles of displacement, instability, insecurity, uncertainty, chaos and mayhem. We risk leaving an entire generation behind. This will have severe impact on their lives, as well as all our lives.

Education Cannot Wait (ECW) and all our partners – be it strategic donors, the private sector, ministries of education, UN agencies, civil society and local communities – have proven again and again that it is indeed possible to make a difference and a bold impact. It is indeed possible to extinguish the fire, reduce the speed of the avalanche and turn challenges into opportunities. In just a few years, we jointly and collectively delivered a continued quality education to over 11 million children and adolescents in the harshest circumstances on earth.

With more funding, we could double that number in just over a year. With even more funding, we can and will eventually become a collective force of nature that makes sure that every child and young person in crises reaches their potential. When they reach their potential through a quality education, they will be the force of nature for their societies and the world at large, be it in science, in business, as highly-qualified teachers, or any other profession that every society needs to thrive and make an impact.

The needs have never been greater. At the same time, the evidenced-based model for success has never been stronger. This is not the time to fear to fail, nor for closing our eyes to the reality, or the power of education to resolve it.

This is an investment in the human potential at its best. It is an investment in stronger economies and greater stability across the globe. No one loses. All are winners.

According to the United Nations, there is a US$100 billion annual financing gap to achieve the education targets in low- and lower-middle income countries. ECW is calling for a tiny part of that figure to make a major impact. That is US$600 million to deliver on the goals outlined in our four-year strategic plan: to reach 20 million crisis-impacted children and adolescents.

The need for collaboration has never been more important. In January, ECW and our close strategic partner the Global Partnership for Education (GPE) issued a Complementarity Note that underscores the value-addition of our individual organizations and charts a path toward increased results, impact, coordination and collaboration. We ensure that there is no duplication, nor double funding. Rather, we provide a holistic approach based on each other’s comparative advantage. The same applies for the third funding mechanism of IFFEd, the International Finance Facility for Education. With the resources required, these three funds work with all our partners to deliver comprehensively and completely. It is possible.

In Sudan, for example, recent analysis from OCHA indicates that of the 4.2 million targeted through the humanitarian response toward education, only 777,000 have been reached thus far, and of the US$131 million humanitarian funding ask for education, only US$22.8 million has been funded thus far. That is an 83% funding gap.

It is astonishing considering that education is both lifesaving and has the power to reduce aid-dependency in the long run. Now, more than ever, we need to step up funding for education in emergencies and protracted crises. Humanitarian, development, public and private sector funding can make a huge contribution to address the vicious cycle of humanitarian crises.

We should make no mistake: the children and adolescents in crises are extremely resilient due to their soul-shattering experiences. Once they get an education, they will certainly tap into extraordinary innovation, unbreakable courage and a limitless source of creativity. Then, they will show us how to make the impossible possible.

In conclusion, we need to connect the dots and see the whole picture. Climate change is no less of a major factor in disrupting education than conflict. Indeed, conflicts, climate change and forced displacement are all interconnected humanitarian crises. In this month’s high-level interview, we discuss the connection between education and climate change with ECW’s Climate Champion Adenike Oladosu. Funding climate change demands funding education, too. We cannot afford to separate the two.

Or, as the multi-faceted Leonardo da Vinci once said: “Learn how to see. Realize that everything connects to everything else.”

The 234 million children and adolescents deprived of a quality education are connected to 8 billion people, our future as a human species and the progress of our world. Making an investment requires us to see the whole picture. It is not an option. It is a call for action.

Yasmine Sherif is Executive Director of Education Cannot Wait

IPS UN Bureau

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By External Source
Jan 16 2025 (IPS-Partners)

 
Adenike Oladosu is a leading Nigerian ecofeminist, climate justice leader and researcher. She was appointed as an ECW Global Climate Champion on World Environment Day in June 2024. In December of last year, Adenike was honored by #BBC100Women, selected as one of the BBC’s 100 most influential and inspiring women from around the world. She was also a finalist for the Pritzker Emerging Environmental Genius Award.

Adenike earned a first-class degree in Agricultural Economics. She is one of Africa’s most vocal environmental activists. In 2019, she became a recipient of the Ambassador of Conscience by Amnesty International – Nigeria for her fight for climate justice and human rights. She is a writer both for her blog post and for the international newspaper. Adenike is a two-term Nigerian youth delegate to the United Nations Climate Change Conference since COP25 in Spain and subsequent COPs. She started her pan-African climate justice movement called “I Lead Climate Action Initiative”. Through her initiative, she has empowered more than 30,000 Indigenous women and girls in different communities and mobilized millions of people for climate action as the initiator of the Fridays For Future in Nigeria, and the first African to join the movement in 2018. Adenike has developed a curriculum on climate change and ecofeminism in Africa. She is also pioneering the interconnection between climate change and democracy.

Oladosu holds a residency fellowship at the Panel on Planetary Thinking at Justus Liebig University in Giessen, Germany on using Earth Observation to restore shrinking Planetary Spaces: A Case Study of Lake Chad. She was a past fellow at The New Institute in Hamburg, Germany on black feminism and polycrisis. Oladosu was awarded the International Climate Protection Award by the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation on the protection of Lake Chad as a peace and conflict resolution pathway, achieving protection through mapping and data generation.

ECW: Congratulations on being honored as a #BBC100Women 2024: one of BBC’s 100 most influential and inspiring women from around the world! As ECW’s Global Climate Champion – and a leading advocate on climate, education and gender equality – what are three key messages you want to send to world leaders on the climate-education crisis?

Adenike Oladosu: Number one. Education is one of the most powerful weapons we have to solve the climate crisis.

Number two. Empowerment in education is key to unlocking the potential of innovation.

Number three. Education must be included in the climate finance decision-making process. It is a necessary tool to prevent even more crisis-impacted children from being pushed from the safety and protection of quality learning environments. It will also be key in addressing the growing displacement crisis and can be used as a mechanism to address loss and damage to critical infrastructure.

ECW: At this year’s COP29 in Baku, you joined the ECW delegation to connect the dots between climate action and education action. Why should education be embedded into climate finance decisions to accelerate the ambition of Nationally Determined Contributions, National Adaptation Plans, and other climate actions?

Adenike Oladosu: Education is important because we need to deal with the immediate impacts of the climate crisis Right Here, Right Now. In the most vulnerable countries, education can be used as a tool to prevent forced migration and internal displacement. Think about it this way: climate crises, such as droughts and floods, regularly lead to displacement. This results in more out-of-school children. The number of hours or days lost in school might not be replaceable.

These are all avoidable consequences of climate change, especially if there is financing to respond to those realities. Climate financing could serve as an aid to prevent current and future loss and damage. In terms of education, this includes the loss of valuable infrastructure like the tens of thousands of schools destroyed by the floods in Pakistan, lives lost because sufficient early warning systems are not in place, and the economic losses that prevent communities from building resilient economic systems. If those out-of-school children – or children that lack access to consistent quality education – are brought back to the classroom, we could see amazing impact on all Sustainable Development Goals and the goals outlined in the Paris Agreement. We can also use education as a system to pay back communities for the loss and damage generated by climate change.

Schools are valuable community hubs. Free education and healthy school meals could serve as an incentive to children. Quality education can also foster a learning environment that prepares tomorrow’s leaders with the green skills they need to strive and set the pace for innovation and technology.

Everyone has a solution to give. I urge every country to include education in their Nationally Determined Contributions and National Adaptation Plans. Education in itself is an adaptation strategy. No investment in education is a waste; it is both an adaptation and mitigation measure. Connecting education with climate finance can save lives, build resilience and foster peace. Children – especially those on the frontlines of the world’s most severe humanitarian crises – did not cause the climate crisis, and yet they bear the brunt of its impacts. It is our responsibility to do whatever it takes to keep them in the classroom. Education Cannot Wait and its donors and strategic partners are creating a value proposition to connect education with climate action. Education provides a key entry point to address loss and damage, anticipatory action, disaster risk reduction and resilience building, and is an essential element of our plans to address this devastating crisis.

ECW: In your homeland of Nigeria, the climate crisis is derailing development gains, triggering conflicts and displacing children. In all, 18 million girls and boys are out of school. How is climate change impacting education in Nigeria and the Lake Chad area, and how can education be leveraged as a tool to build climate resilience?

Adenike Oladosu: In Nigeria, 18 million girls and boys are out of school. This is a loss and damage issue directly related to the climate crisis. Throughout the country, and especially in the Lake Chad area, we are faced with the multiple effects of climate change; from slow to rapid events including droughts and floods. When these events occur, millions become victims.

For families who cannot afford a daily meal and earn less than $1 a day, education is not a priority. Their priority is survival. So, girls are pushed into marriage at a young age. They are also tasked with many of the household chores, such as walking long distances to get water. This eventually leads to dropping out of school due to the loss of livelihood and drought respectively. Meanwhile, boys are becoming vulnerable to recruitment into dangerous terrorist groups. They become the perpetrators of violence in their communities rather than the changemakers. If those millions of children out of school are educated, they could become innovators, technicians, educators, and other professionals to add value to their society and become pacesetters. With education, the dreams of the 18 million girls and boys who are out of school could become a reality. They could become agriculturalists, providing climate-smart innovations to tackle hunger and climate change, or public health experts to tackle environmental health issues – even become the president of a country, leading the way in making better decisions that could position citizens and cities towards sustainability. Furthermore, education could also open the space for solving pressing issues so that, one day, we can save Lake Chad from drying out.

Education could help in making the right choices and delivering on the promise of Universal Human Rights. This entails children and adolescents knowing their rights to clean water or preventing them from joining harmful groups. Education is a human right, along with the right to life and liberty, freedom from slavery and torture, freedom of opinion and expression, and the right to work and play an active part in society. Climate justice must also be considered a human right.

ECW: Climate change affects girls differently than boys; with girls more impacted, especially when it comes to their education. What steps would you take to empower girls in our global efforts to save our people and our planet from the catastrophic risks of climate change?

Adenike Oladosu: The most outstanding empowerment for girls is skills acquisition and education. I encourage other girls to have both because it will become useful at every stage of one’s life. It is a lifesaving tool in providing solutions to the world’s biggest problems.

My recent documentary with ZDF, tells the reality of a girl child whose life and future has been impacted by the climate crisis. Providing them with an enabling environment that could support their continuous learning can be both lifesaving and life-transforming. One example is the ability to get water within their reach rather than walking a long distance. This could save time and energy, which could be converted to reading their books. Another example is the educational approach of enlightening the traditional rulers on the best practices that could help value and support the rights of the girl child. Furthermore, education can support the livelihood (a climate-smart livelihood) of the parents so that the girl child is not used as a hawking tool around the streets and to prevent them from being exposed to sexual violence and other threats. We can also provide scholarships and other incentives in return for commitments from girls and their communities to attend school. Additionally, climate finance could help in preventing those crises and offers a quick and effective response, because at displacement camps, girls are vulnerable to human rights abuses and other grave violations.

ECW: We all know that ‘readers are leaders’ and that reading skills are key to every child’s education. What are three books that have most influenced you personally and/or professionally, and why would you recommend them to others?

Adenike Oladosu: Becoming by Michelle Obama, Unbowed: A Memoir by Maathai Wangari, We Should all be Feminists by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. These three books have one thing in common: they are deeply and closely related to the entanglement of the women’s vision of the world and how society perceives us. The struggles and the pain of how they evolve to be a great woman. It ties to my life story of where I came from and who I have become. Professionally, it gives me the courage to use my skills, platforms and activism to change the world. And reminds me that I can be what I want to be and break gender biases.

They are all educated women who have risen to affluence and become powerful. I have a story to tell and a solution I can offer to the world in different ways. From politician to activist to writer. They are all changemakers trying to transform the world. If they can do it, I can and so can we. Their story is our story.

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By External Source
Jan 2 2025 (IPS-Partners)

 
Richard Bennett was appointed as the Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Afghanistan in April 2022. He has served in Afghanistan on several occasions in different capacities, including as the Chief of the Human Rights Service with the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan. He has previously played a role in the promotion and protection of human rights in Afghanistan and supported the United Nations on a number of human rights issues, such as protection of civilians, transitional justice, child rights, rule of law, rights of people with disabilities, protection of human rights defenders and a range of economic, social and cultural rights.

Bennett also served with the United Nations as the Representative of the High Commissioner for Human Rights and head of the human rights components of peacekeeping operations in Sierra Leone, Timor-Leste and South Sudan – as well as twice in Afghanistan (2003-2007 and 2018-2019). He has been a long-term adviser to the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission. From 2007 to 2010, Bennett was the Representative of the High Commissioner for Human Rights in Nepal and head of OHCHR’s office there. He has also been Chief of Staff for the UN Secretary-General’s Panel of Experts on Sri Lanka and Special Adviser to the Assistant Secretary-General for Human Rights in New York.

Bennett worked for Amnesty International from 2014–2017 initially as its Asia-Pacific Program Director, and later as head of Amnesty’s United Nations Office in New York. From mid-2019, he worked as a consultant on UN human rights assignments in Afghanistan, Myanmar and New York.

ECW: For more than three years, girls in Afghanistan have been banned from attending school beyond the sixth grade. In your latest report to the UN General Assembly, you describe a worsening human rights situation under the de facto authorities, particularly for girls and women. What impact is the education ban having on Afghan girls and on Afghan society as a whole?

Richard Bennett: The ban on education for girls above the sixth grade is of course having a devastating impact on Afghan girls. They see their future lives and opportunities having been narrowed almost entirely to the domestic sphere, and this, combined with the prospect of early or forced marriage, has driven thousands of them into depression. Self-harm, including suicides and suicidal ideation, has risen dramatically. Families are being torn apart, with siblings separated, and communities fractured. The education ban is impacting Afghan society as a whole. Let alone the denial of the fundamental right to education, no society can prosper if half the population is not able to contribute to its economy. The long-term consequences include deepening poverty and gender inequality, an increase in gender-based violence and child marriage, and more child labour and other forms of exploitation. The devastating consequences will be intersectional and intergenerational. Education is a fundamental right and also provides crucial protection. Society as a whole suffers almost irreparably when half the population is systematically excluded from life opportunities.

ECW: Despite the ban, many girls and young women are finding alternative ways to continue to learn. Why is it crucial for donors to continue funding multilateral organizations, such as Education Cannot Wait, who are working together to provide education access and support to Afghan girls and women?

Richard Bennett: Continuing donor support for organizations like Education Cannot Wait is crucial in this time of crisis for girls’ education in Afghanistan. Despite the ban, alternative and informal educational pathways are emerging to offer hope and learning opportunities for Afghan girls and women. However, for these programmes to be effective, resilient and safe, they must be equipped with adequate resources and expertise to support both student learning and emotional well-being.

Programmes supported by Education Cannot Wait offer a lifeline at a very difficult time for girls in Afghanistan, enabling them to continue learning, equipping them for a better future and providing hope and psychological sustenance. Moreover, they align with the international community’s commitment to the right to education as a universal value and do so within the principles of universality and inclusion.

Funding ECW’s initiatives is not only an investment in resilience and gender equality, but also in the future of today’s children – and, ultimately, in the prospects for peaceful, sustainable, long-term recovery of Afghanistan. Without such support, millions of girls and young women risk being left in the shadows, perpetuating cycles of despair and marginalization.

ECW: Your analysis emphasizes that the denial of girls’ and women’s right to education is part of a broader system of gender-based oppression amounting to “gender persecution,” a situation that many Afghans and human rights advocates describe as “gender apartheid.” Could you elaborate on this concept and explain why it needs to be urgently addressed?

Richard Bennett: The Taliban’s system of discrimination, segregation, disrespect for human dignity, and exclusion is pervasive and methodical. It is enforced through edicts, decrees and policies, often with strict implementation and sometimes violent punishment for transgressions. Every restriction on the rights of women and girls – whether on their rights to education, healthcare, freedom of movement, access to justice, or women’s right to work – is interlinked and mutually reinforcing.

Cumulatively, these deprivations are so severe and extensive, I have concluded that they may amount to crimes against humanity, in particular the crime of gender persecution. These are crimes under international law. They are not only ongoing, they are intensifying.

Further, in my discussions with Afghans, especially women, they consistently emphasize that the term “gender apartheid” most accurately describes their lived experiences and best captures the ideological and institutionalized nature of the Taliban’s discrimination and oppression of women and girls. There is a growing movement, which I support, advocating for the formal codification of gender apartheid in a future treaty on crimes against humanity.

Whether we describe what is happening in Afghanistan as gender persecution or gender apartheid, it is clear that the situation is not only unacceptable – it is unconscionable. We all have a collective responsibility to challenge and dismantle this appalling system and to hold those responsible to account.

ECW: You have been an early supporter of Education Cannot Wait’s #AfghanGirlsVoices global advocacy campaign, which amplifies testimonies of Afghan girls denied access to education and who are fighting for their rights. What message would you like to share globally to further mobilize support for their right to education?

Richard Bennett: To the global community, I say this: the courage and resilience of Afghan girls fighting for their right to learn is nothing short of heroic. Their voices remind us that education is a fundamental right, not a privilege. We must amplify their stories and rally resources to ensure they are heard everywhere and are not forgotten.

My personal interactions with Afghan girls, whether they are 11th grade students I met in the north of Afghanistan in 2022 who continue to pursue education despite the subsequent closure of their school, or the survivors of the Kaaj Academy bombing who I’ve met in Kabul, Türkiye and Europe, or the members of the winning Afghan Girls’ Robotics Team, they continue to inspire and motivate me. The world must stand in solidarity with Afghan girls and women, sending a clear message that their dreams and potential matter and that the denial of education to them is an injustice that may rise to the level of a crime against humanity.

Together, we can create pathways to hope and opportunity, even in the face of adversity. The message is clear: we cannot allow the dreams and potential of millions of Afghan girls to be extinguished. The time to act is now, and every effort counts.

ECW: We know that ‘readers are leaders’ and that reading skills are key to every child’s education, no matter who or where they are. What are three books that have most influenced you personally and/or professionally, and why would you recommend them to others?

Richard Bennett: It’s hard to choose three, but here is my list:

No Good Men Among the Living: America, the Taliban, and the War Through Afghan Eyes by Anand Gopal; often the first book I recommend to newcomers to Afghanistan and essential reading for those who wish to understand how America got it so wrong.

A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry; Almost 30 years ago, I read this exquisitely written, somewhat bleak but transformative novel set in India and it left an indelible mark on me. The balance is, of course, between hope and despair, so relevant for Afghans today.

Outspoken: My Fight for Freedom and Human Rights in Afghanistan by Sima Samar; published in 2024, this memoir by my first boss in Afghanistan is recommended reading for Afghan girls and boys looking for a role model. She is a doctor, human rights defender and, not least, the founder of schools and a fighter for girls’ education.

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Yasmine Sherif with children at a school in Ethiopia

By Yasmine Sherif
NEW YORK, Dec 20 2024 (IPS)

As 2024 comes to a close, I dare to say that this has been an especially gruesome year for millions upon millions of young children, their parents and their teachers. The world has witnessed one horrific crisis of cruelty, dispossession and human suffering after another.

Ukraine has entered its worst winter, suffering a brutal war with 65% of its energy supplies destroyed. While the West Bank is increasingly under attack, Gaza is still under bombardment, 1 million Palestinians lack shelter in the cold and, as the Under-Secretary-General and Emergency Relief Coordinator for OCHA, Tom Fletcher, stated, “Gaza is apocalyptic right now.”

Meanwhile, the gruesome internal armed conflict in Sudan rages on, having caused over 11 million internally displaced and over 3 million refugees in neighboring countries. Each carries the yoke of profound human suffering. From Lebanon, Yemen and the Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh to the Sahel and across sub-Saharan Africa, millions of children have very little hope left for a future.

Girls in Afghanistan beyond grade 6 remain shackled to their homes, banned from continuing their learning. Countless children have to live with the life-long consequences of surviving rape and brutal sexual violence – sometimes as mere babies – in armed conflicts in the DRC, North-East Nigeria and beyond. In the Sahel, children have to flee their villages on fire with nothing more than their last piece of cloth on their frail bodies. In Latin America, Venezuelan refugee children continue to struggle in exile, facing dangers in every corner, from trafficking and gangs, to missing out on the opportunity of an education and a future.

These are real examples of some of the 44 countries and contexts in which ECW invests financial resources towards a holistic quality education, safe learning environments and school meals.

The question is: are we all doing enough?

As many will know, Education Cannot Wait is a global platform in the UN system, hosted by UNICEF. It is made up of our High-Level Steering Group, our Executive Committee and our Secretariat, along with strategic public and private donor partners, Ministers of Education and numerous admirable and hard-working UN and civil society partners, as well as communities.

ECW is able to deliver with speed because it is a catalyst that brings together partners who operate with the same level of commitment, energy and determination. We are also able to deliver with depth and quality because we share the same vision of a child-centered approach and learning outcomes.

In the midst of this very dark year, Education Cannot Wat delivered on its mission, making more than US$228 million in investments, including US$44 million in First Emergency Responses, US$176 million in Multi-Year Resilience Programmes and US$8 million in Acceleration Facility grants – the latter for piloting innovative approaches.

Our funding gap was further closed as we reached nearly US$1 billion in financial resources for our 2023-2026 Strategic Plan. But more resources are urgently needed if we are to cater to the actual needs and reach, at minimum, 20 million children (pre-school, primary and secondary) and their teachers by the end of this strategic period.

With an additional US$570 million, we can completely close this gap. It is possible. When annual military expenditures worldwide stand at US$2.4 trillion, there is no justification whatsoever to fail in investing a minimum of US$570 million for Education Cannot Wait to support lifesaving and life-sustaining education for children enduring the brunt of man-made and climate crises; as well as to invest substantive financial resources to our sister-funds, such as the Global Partnership for Education (GPE) and the International Finance Facility for Education (IFFEd).

As our ongoing analysis and research at Education Cannot Wait indicates, the number of children in emergencies and protracted crises – who are denied or deprived an education – is getting closer to a quarter of a billion children and adolescents. We can prevent this.

While we are all trying to do something, we can and must do so much more. It is possible.

This leads me to the founder and outgoing High-Level Steering Group Chair of Education Cannot Wait, The Rt. Hon. Gordon Brown, the UN Special Envoy for Global Education. He had a vision that led to the creation of Education Cannot Wait. Joined by strategic partners in governments, the UN and civil society, he pulled through its establishment at the World Humanitarian Summit.

In just a few years, this vision has turned into over 11 million children, adolescents and teachers benefitting from a quality education in the harshest circumstances around the globe.

In the immortal words of Viktor Frankl: “The world is in a bad state, but everything will become still worse unless each of us does his [and her] best.”

The Rt. Hon. Gordon Brown did his best and has made an incredible difference transforming millions of lives and generations to come.

Let his legacy inspire us all.

With this, on behalf of the whole Education Cannot Wait family, I wish you Happy Holidays. May 2025 be a brighter year.

Yasmine Sherif is Executive Director of Education Cannot Wait

IPS UN Bureau

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Furtuna (5) is getting the early education she deserves, and she loves counting with children at the Mahabre Dego Primary School, Tigray Region, Ethiopia. ECW and strategic partners’ investments in the country provide much-needed support for young crisis-affected girls and boys to have a better start in life through quality early education. Credit: ECW/Tesfaye

By Joyce Chimbi
ADDIS ABABA & NAIROBI, Dec 9 2024 (IPS)

Ethiopia’s education system is buckling under the weight of complex, competing challenges. The aftermath of a deadly war in the north, ongoing violence, climate-induced disasters, and widespread forced displacements have converged to push as many as 9 million children out of school. With close to 18 percent of schools in the country destroyed or damaged and persisting intercommunal conflicts in various regions, there are fears that many might never find their way back to school.

“In the absence of education, both boys and girls may be mobilized into militant groups, and frequently, girls will be subjected to child marriage. The choice is to provide them with an education, as it is the pathway to their future and contribution to their society and also as a protection mechanism,” says Yasmine Sherif, Executive Director of Education Cannot Wait (ECW), the global fund for education in emergencies and protracted crises in the United Nations. “Being out-of-school puts them in harm’s way and onto the path of abuse, violations, and the destruction of their lives, their communities, and eventually their country. We must ensure that no child is left behind in the education system. Investing in the very real potential of Ethiopia’s young generation is not an option—it is an absolute necessity.”

Sherif traveled to the Tigray region in the first week of December 2024 together with the ECW Global Champion and Finance Minister of Denmark, Nicolai Wammen. ECW’s high-level delegation saw first-hand the devastating effects of the deadly three-year conflict between the Ethiopian central government and the northernmost region of Tigray, Ethiopia.

Yasmine Sherif, Executive Director, Education Cannot Wait (ECW) and Nicolai Wammen, ECW Global Champion and Danish Minister of Finance, visit a school in the Tigray Region in Ethiopia. The delegation met with girls and boys whose education was interrupted for over three years due to conflict. Thanks to ECW & strategic partners’ support in the region, students are back in the classroom where they belong.
Credit: ECW/Tesfaye

The aftermath and recovery process are such that, amid limited resources, the country is putting back the pieces of a broken education infrastructure to jumpstart an education system that had come to a complete halt. At the end of their joint visit, the two called for bold donor action to deliver the promise of a quality education to millions of crisis-impacted children.

“We have a multi-year investment and great partners on the ground, including a very supportive government. We work with UN agencies, including UNICEF, and civil society organizations such as Save the Children, the Norwegian Refugee Council, Image1Day and other local Ethiopian organizations,” Sherif told IPS.

The ECW delegation visited schools benefiting from funding by ECW and strategic partners, met children, parents, and teachers, and saw first-hand the impact of ECW-supported programmes. In one school alone, enrollment increased by an impressive 20 percent last year due to a comprehensive package of interventions funded by ECW.

“It is heartwarming to witness the life-transforming power of quality education in the most complex crisis situations. I met strong and resilient girls and boys who are returning to learning, healing and thriving thanks to ECW’s support. However, conflicts, climate change and other crises continue to push millions of children out of school every year—in Ethiopia and beyond. Business as usual will not meet this challenge. I encourage private sector partners to join ECW’s efforts and invest in new and innovative financing strategies to fill the widening gap,” said Nicolai Wammen, Minister of Finance, Denmark, and ECW Global Champion.

Breiy Nuguse is a teacher at the ECW-supported FreKalsi Primary School in the Tigray Region, Ethiopia, where children are back in classrooms after over three years of missing out on an education due to the conflict that devasted the region. “Teaching makes me happy. I love teaching and when I see children learn, it is so rewarding. I was inspired to become a teacher, as my teachers were so wonderful when I was at school. I realize the gift of learning that they gave me, and I wanted to do the same for the next generation,” Nuguse said. Credit: ECW//Tesfaye

Sherif says the delegation saw significant progress in supported schools, such as “rehabilitated infrastructure and others rebuilt from scratch. We saw learning supplies, teachers who are well trained and sensitized, and professionals offering mental health and psychosocial services. There is a strong academic curriculum. Included in the national curriculum are critical issues of peacebuilding, ethics, and the arts. Education is ongoing in primary and secondary schools but also in pre-primary and early childhood development schools. Children with disabilities also benefit from targeted supports and inclusive education.”

Overall, they witnessed a protective learning environment that included systematic implementation of a referral identification of children in need and distribution of assistive devices, and children in need of assistance integrated with their peers, which promotes their inclusion and improves their social and learning skills.

There were girls’ clubs too for pursuit of shared and common interests. Teachers are trained on gender-sensitive issues, and there is systematic implementation of menstrual hygiene for adolescent girls, designated sanitation areas for girls, and promotion of water and sanitation.

Displaced and host community students who attend the ECW-supported Embandaso Primary School in the Tigray Region, Ethiopia, enjoy drawing so they can express their feelings and their dreams.
Credit: ECW/Tesfaye

“The children are receiving quality, safe, and inclusive holistic education. Having gone through mental health and psychosocial support through ECW investment, they are confident and expressive of their dreams. This is what investment in education can do, and we can do even more through bold donor action to reach every child with quality education and prospects for lifelong learning and earning,” Sherif observes.

But the challenges are still significantly complex and pressing, and resources are scarce.

Ethiopia also hosts the third largest refugee population in Africa, significantly exacerbating the country’s educational challenges. There were over 200,000 new arrivals from Sudan and Somalia in 2023-2024 alone, further increasing pressure on existing resources.

After a visit that revealed the numerous challenges Ethiopian children face and their unwavering determination to learn, ECW announced a USD 5 million First Emergency Response grant, increasing its total investments in the country to USD 93 million since 2017.

Of the new USD 5 million grant, UNICEF will be the implementing partner for USD 4 million. A local organization, Imagine 1Day, will implement the remaining USD 1 million. The organizations will work together with their partners to address urgent needs in the Oromia and Afar regions, where renewed conflict, intercommunal violence, drought and displacement have further disrupted education services in recent months.

These emergency interventions will build on the USD 24 million Multi-Year Resilience Programme announced last month by ECW, targeting needs in the Amhara, Somalia, and Tigray regions.

Yasmine Sherif, Executive Director, Education Cannot Wait (ECW) and Nicolai Wammen, ECW Global Champion and Danish Minister of Finance, are welcomed by students at the ECW-supported Chila Primary School in Tigray, Ethiopia. Children here have missed more than three years of education due to COVID and the conflict that devastated the region.
Photo credit: ECW

“Imagine1Day is deeply grateful for this Education Cannot Wait First Emergency Response grant. With this generous support, we will provide over 13,000 out-of-school children in the Afar region—60 percent of whom are girls and 13 percent are children with disabilities—with access to safe learning environments. This project will not only enhance their well-being but also empower them to reach their full potential. Given that education in emergencies in Ethiopia has been severely underfunded, this grant is crucial in ensuring that crisis-affected children receive the education and support they need to build a brighter future,” said Dr. Seid Aman, Country Director of Imagine1Day.

To date, ECW’s combined multi-year and emergency investments in Ethiopia have reached more than 550,000 children and adolescents, providing a comprehensive range of supports—school rehabilitation, teacher training, mental health and psychosocial support, inclusive education, school feeding, gender transformative initiatives, early childhood education, and more. ECW’s support focuses on the most vulnerable, including girls, children from refugee, displaced and host community communities, and children with disabilities.

ECW’s investments are aligned to the Ethiopia Humanitarian Response Plan and the Ethiopia Education Sector Development Programme VI, a detailed planning document that provides a comprehensive outlook of the roadmap that the country’s education sector is taking. The Global Fund urgently calls for additional resources to fill the USD 64 million funding gap to meet the requirements for the acute education needs in the 2024 Humanitarian Response Plan for Ethiopia.

Working in emergency and protracted crisis settings across the globe, ECW supports quality education outcomes for refugee, internally displaced, and other crisis-affected girls and boys, so no one is left behind.

IPS UN Bureau Report

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Adenike Oladosu, ECW’s Climate Champion from Nigeria, during an interview with IPS at COP29. Credit: Joyce Chimbi/IPS

By Joyce Chimbi
BAKU, Nov 20 2024 (IPS)

Education is under threat as multiple crises push children out of school and into harms way. COP29 Baku could break historical barriers that hold back education from playing a unique, critical role to accelerate the ambition of nationally determined contributions (NDCs) to the Paris Agreement, protecting people and planet from life-threatening risks of climate change.

“Together with our partners, we have launched a pilot program in Somalia and Afghanistan, working with communities to identify early action activities or anticipatory action to act against the impacts of climate and minimize its disruption on children’s lives and education in those countries,” says Dianah Nelson, Chief of Education, Education Cannot Wait (ECW), the global fund for education in emergencies and protracted crises within the United Nations. 

Towards embedding education into the climate finance debate, ECW held a series of COP29 side events on such issues as unlocking the potential of anticipatory action through multi-stakeholder collaboration; meeting the challenge of conflict, climate and education; climate change-resilient education systems in the most vulnerable nations; and protecting children’s futures: why loss and damage must prioritise education in emergencies.

Panel discussions brought together a wide range of public and private partners, policymakers, and data experts to highlight the benefits of acting ahead of predicted climate shocks to protect education. “The climate crisis is an education crisis, and education cannot wait. We, therefore, need to center climate action on education and build climate-smart school technology. And most importantly, we need anticipatory action to reduce or eradicate the impact of climate shocks on children. Everyone has a contribution to make, and every child has a dream. Uninterrupted access to education makes their dream a reality. We need to safeguard or protect our schools from being vulnerable, or being attacked in conflict, or even being washed away by flood,” Adenike Oladosu, ECW’s Climate Champion and Nigerian climate justice advocate, told IPS.

Dianah Nelson, Chief of Education at ECW, during one of the sessions hosted by ECW. The sessions highlighted the need to ensure there is funding for education for those on the frontlines of the climate crisis, armed conflict and other emergencies. Credit: ECW

These climatic impacts are already being felt in Pakistan. Zulekha, advisor/program manager of the Gender and Child Cell NDMA Pakistan, spoke about how the country has suffered “severe impacts from extreme weather. More than 24,000 schools were damaged in the 2022 floods, and nearly 3.5 million children were displaced and their educations put at risk. We were still reeling from the effects of the floods in 2023 when we started to launch the refresher of the Pakistan School Safety Framework.”

Oladosu spoke about the multiple, complex challenges confronting Nigeria and that anticipatory action “means bringing in the tools, through climate financing, to reduce the loss and damage. Anticipatory action addresses complex humanitarian crises in a proactive rather than reactive way to reduce the impact of a shock before its most severe effects are felt.”

She stressed that anticipatory actions are critical to avoid “losses that are simply irreplaceable, such as the number of days children spend out of school due to climate events, those left behind the education system, or even those who fall out of the system and into child marriages and militia groups.”

Education must reach every child impacted by a climate crisis they did not make. Credit: UNICEF

Lisa Doughten, Director, Financing and Partnership Division at OCHA, stated that in humanitarian crises, climate change “is significantly disrupting the overall access to education as schools temporarily shut down due to extreme climate events causing significant learning disruptions for millions of students. We have countries in conflict and fragile settings, and the climate crisis creates extremely difficult circumstances for, especially children and women.”

Doughten spoke about the need to leverage data to get ahead of predictable climate disasters and how OCHA works with various partners, including meteorological organizations, to monitor and use climate data. Using models that entail pre-planned programs, pre-determined triggers for weather events such as floods and storms, and pre-financing to ensure that funds are disbursed with speed towards anticipatory actions.

At COP29, ECW reiterated the power of education to unite communities, build consensus, and transform entire societies. In the classroom of the future, children will acquire the green skills they need to thrive in the new economy of the 21st century, and communities will come together to share early warnings and act in advance of climate hazards such as droughts and floods.

Graham Lang, Deputy Director at ECW, at one of the sessions hosted by the Global Fund aimed at ensuring those on the frontlines of the climate crisis, armed conflict and other emergencies are central to climate education action, decisions and commitments. Credit: ECW

Stressing that in this classroom of the future, “an entire generation of future leaders can build the will and commitment to break down the status quo and create true lasting solutions to this unprecedented and truly terrifying crisis. Unfortunately, multilateral climate finance has not prioritized the education sector to date, meaning a tiny proportion, at most 0.03 percent, of all climate finance is spent on education. While children have the most to offer in building long-term solutions to the crisis, they also have the most to lose.”

ECW says the connection between climate action and education is also noticeably underrepresented in NDCs, or national commitments to adapt to and mitigate the impacts of climate change. Only half of all NDCs are child and youth sensitive, and this is an urgent situation for, in 2022 alone, over 400 million children experienced school closures as the result of extreme weather.

According to the Global Fund, “on the frontlines of the world’s worst humanitarian crises, these disruptions will often push children out of the education system forever. In places like Chad, Nigeria, and Sudan, where millions of children are already out of school, it could impact the future of an entire generation. ECW’s disaster-resilient classrooms, for instance, boosted enrolment rates in Chad.”

Amid Chad’s multidimensional challenges compounded by climate change, climate-resilient classrooms whose construction was funded by ECW and completed in March 2022 meant that classrooms were more durable and accessible for children and adolescents with disabilities. These classrooms withstood the heaviest rainy season in 30 years, triggering widespread flooding. Committing needed finances and acting with speed and urgency means bringing solutions within reach.

Accordingly, ECW says a key step is increasing access to the main climate funds—including the Global Environment Facility and Green Climate Fund—and activating new innovative financing modalities to deliver with speed, depth, and impact, and that the funding needs to be faster, transparent, and fully coordinated across both humanitarian and development sectors.

Looking forward to COP30 in Brazil, ECW stressed that education must play an integral role in the new Loss and Damage Fund. Education losses caused by climate change take unprecedented tolls on societies, especially in countries impacted by conflicts, displacement, and other pressing humanitarian emergencies.

Further emphasizing that the “loss and damage connected with years of lost learning may seem hard to quantify. But we know that for every USD 1 invested in a girl’s education, we see USD 2.80 in return. And we know that education isn’t just a privilege; it’s a human right. Finally, we need to ensure the New Collective Quantified Goal on climate finance includes a firm commitment to educating all the world’s children. Not just the easy-to-reach, but the ones that are the most vulnerable, the millions whose lives are being ripped apart by a crisis not of their own making.”

IPS UN Bureau Report

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By External Source
Nov 4 2024 (IPS-Partners)

 
Matthias Schmale is the Assistant Secretary-General, UN Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator in Ukraine. Schmale brings more than 30 years of experience in humanitarian and development work. He previously served as Senior Adviser to the UN Development Coordination Office’s regional team for Africa, as Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator (a.i) in Nigeria, and in several high-level positions with the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNWRA), including Director for UNRWA Affairs in Lebanon, Gaza and New York, acting Chief of Staff and acting Deputy Commissioner General.

Before joining the United Nations, he held senior positions in the International Red Cross and Red Crescent movement, and non-government organizations at global, regional and country level, including in Ethiopia, Kenya, Sudan, Switzerland and the United Kingdom. He holds a PhD in development economics and a master’s degree in macroeconomics from Berlin’s Free University.

ECW: As the war in Ukraine stretches into its third year, the education of 4 million children has been disrupted, with 600,000 children unable to access in-person learning due to ongoing fighting and displacement. How can world leaders support access to quality education for children in Ukraine impacted by this war, as well as for Ukraine refugee children in neighboring states?

Matthias Schmale: The obvious answer to this question is that world leaders must work to the best of their abilities and in full respect of the UN Charter and the territorial integrity of Ukraine to help end the devastating full-scale invasion by the armed forces of the Russian Federation. Quality education requires a peaceful and stable environment and for refugee children to have the choice to return home with their parents. World leaders and we all should also not forget the many children struggling to have access to quality education under conditions of illegal occupation and annexation including in Crimea.

Since we unfortunately cannot predict when the war on Ukraine will end, world leaders are asked to ensure that the humanitarian and recovery aid provided by their respective governments is maintained to meet the enormous needs of children in Ukraine and that this support explicitly includes dedicated resources for what is often referred to as education in emergencies. International solidarity has to include funding work to create safe spaces in educational facilities and supporting the government and authorities at all levels in maintaining and strengthening education systems and capacities under very challenging conditions.

ECW: You are an economist by training. How can investments in education through multilateral funds such as Education Cannot Wait help us deliver on the promises made in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and why are such investments crucial for crisis-affected children in Ukraine?

Matthias Schmale: As an economist I would say that not all return on investments can be measured in the form of financial profit. Society at large profits when investments into education maintain the hopes of the young for a more dignified and profitable future!

Every child has a basic right to education and learning, and Education Cannot Wait investments help to realize this right for crisis affected children in Ukraine and elsewhere. Due to Covid followed by the impact of the full-scale invasion, hundreds of thousands of school children in Ukraine have not seen the inside of a classroom for at least five years. So, investments into online learning continue to be crucial. At the same time, we know that online learning can never replace meeting and interacting with other children in safe spaces, and Education Cannot Wait can help create such safe spaces.

I have seen some very impressive examples here in Ukraine, for example in Kharkiv, where portions of a number of metro stations have been converted into safe and fantastic underground classrooms. And when I recently met the Governor of Kherson – that is continuously attacked – he mentioned as one of his priorities creating safe spaces where children can meet, learn and receive mental health support. With public finances in Ukraine severely strained, international solidarity shown through multilateral funds like Education Cannot Wait make all the difference for children struggling to cope with the ongoing war.

ECW: The Global Business Coalition for Education pledged US$50 million from the private sector in support of ECW’s 4-year strategic plan, with 70,000 laptops already shared with schools in Ukraine and neighboring countries. How can, and why should, the private sector continue to provide even more support for education for crisis-impacted children in Ukraine and beyond?

Matthias Schmale: The private sector will be a key driver in building back better and recovery efforts that are already ongoing. This will require a dedicated and healthy workforce, which is why educating children and young people is so critical.

Successful business leaders I have met in the countries and places I have served often told me they are not only successful due to the formal education they received, but that vocational training and acquiring relevant skills often made the real difference. Business leaders must help ensure that curricula are adapted to ensure relevance in public and private schools, and sufficient business-oriented learning and vocational training opportunities are created and made available.

ECW: Two in three Ukraine children in the frontline areas are out of school. They are experiencing challenges in terms of safety, protection, mental health and well-being. How is the United Nations coordinating an integrated cross-sectoral response through its agencies, funds, and programmes to reach these children and ensure they receive holistic support?

Matthias Schmale: It is important to underline that in my understanding the UN’s primary role is to support governments in looking after the welfare and safety of its citizens and ensuring that all have access to the best education and learning possible. The UN team in Ukraine is preparing for lift off of the 5-year Sustainable Development Cooperation Framework agreed with government for the period 2025 to 2029, and we are identifying how we can ensure that the contributions of various agencies are well coordinated and make the maximum impact in the lives of vulnerable children.

At the risk of not mentioning a UN entity and its valuable contribution, this for example includes building on the professional expertise and knowledge of good practice that UNICEF brings around protection of children’s rights and quality learning in safe environments, UNESCO on modernizing curricula and teacher’s training, UNDP on supporting government on mobilizing adequate public financing, UNFPA on protecting children from sexual abuse and violence, UNHCR and IOM in helping ensure no child including internally displaced gets left behind, WHO’s primary and mental health capacities to ensure children are healthy to capitalize on learning opportunities as well as UNOPS in helping repair and eventually rebuild schools. To underline these are just illustrative examples, and as Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator it is my duty to ensure that all 22 UN entities with a presence in country as well as those without are respected for the specific contribution they can make and included in our joint effort to help Ukraine in reaching all vulnerable children.

ECW: We all know that ‘readers are leaders’ and that reading skills are key to every child’s education. What are three books that have most influenced you personally and/or professionally, and why would you recommend them to others?

Matthias Schmale: There are a lot of good writers who wrote excellent books that have influenced me, and it is hard to pick just three among them. J.M. Coutzee, William Darymple and Chimamanda Ngozie Achie continue to intrigue me for the combination of illuminating sensitive topics and encounters between different cultures through their fiction while being highly entertaining at the same time. Darymple’s 1993 City of Djinns is a fascinating travelogue of Dehli, which I devoured in preparation for staying and working there a couple of weeks myself in another life. Coutzee’s 1999 novel “Disgrace” is a rather bleak pre ‘Me-Too’ read about the desires and deficiencies of men. And Chimamanda Ngozie Achie’s acclaimed 2013 “Americanah” explores aspects of race, identity, love, and honesty through a young Nigerian woman’s journey to the United States in pursuit of higher education.

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By Yasmine Sherif
NEW YORK, Nov 1 2024 (IPS)

Africa has the youngest population in the world today. Around 40% of the population is 15 or younger. They have a non-negotiable right to an inclusive and continued quality education, just like young people everywhere across the globe.

As we celebrate Africa Youth Day – and the African Union year of education – we call on world leaders to substantially increase investments in education across the African continent. We can no longer leave them behind. It is time to put them at the forefront.

It is inconceivable that only one in ten children aged 10 in sub-Saharan Africa can read and comprehend a sentence. This is a distressing fact and cause for real alarm.

The potential of the children and adolescents of Africa is unlimited. I have seen their eagerness to learn, their gratitude for every opportunity and their powerful desire to get an education – from the Sahel to the Horn of Africa and beyond.

Sadly, another fact remains: the needs far exceed the financial resources available – especially on the frontlines of armed conflicts, forced displacement and climate change.

Fact is that we can collectively change this. Between 2000 and 2022 primary school completion rates across the region rose from 52% to 67%, and about half of students were able to complete lower secondary education, according to analysis by UNESCO.

In all 17 million young Africans are in university today, and more girls than ever before are able to attend school.

This progress, however, fails to present a full picture of education in Africa. “Of all regions, sub-Saharan Africa has the highest rates of education exclusion. Over one-fifth of children between the ages of about 6 and 11 are out of school, followed by one-third of youth between the ages of about 12 and 14. Almost 60% of youth between the ages of about 15 and 17 are not in school,” according to UNESCO.

Our collective support is now more urgent than ever. It is the smart thing to do for economic progress. It is the right thing to do for equality and equity. It is the least we can do for the people with such immense potentials and yearning to study, to become and to live a full life.

As the global fund for education in emergencies and protracted crises within the United Nations, Education Cannot Wait (ECW) and our strategic partners are working tirelessly to create sustainable education and lifelong learning pathways for all of Africa’s children and youth.

According to our latest Annual Results Report, ECW investments reached over 900,000 children in East Africa with quality learning supports in 2023 alone. In West and Central Africa, we reached over 1.8 million!

In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, young mothers like Meda are realizing their dreams of finishing school. In Chad, where the Sudan regional refugee crisis is straining budgets and resources, girls like Khadidja Abdoulaye are gaining valuable vocational skills in sewing, mechanics and gardening.

This is what collective support can achieve. It gives us a peek into what the African continent of young people can achieve – not just for themselves, but for all of us.

IPS UN Bureau

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Excerpt:

By Yasmine Sherif
NEW YORK, Oct 5 2024 (IPS)

We must build a new social contract for education – a contract based on equality, equity, and universal human rights. At the center of our global efforts to ensure education for all, we must put teachers first in everything we do. They are frontlines heroes who deliver every day to educate children, cultivate young talent, and build a strong society. They are the substitute parents, the mentors and the ones who contribute to shaping the identify of a child in war, in refuge or in climate change.

On World Teachers’ Day, we commend the remarkable work done by teachers on the frontlines of the world’s most severe humanitarian crises. In places like Beirut, Democratic Republic of Congo, Gaza, Haiti, Sudan and Ukraine, these teachers work in dangerous conditions to provide girls and boys with the life-saving – and life-affirming – opportunity that only a quality education can provide.

As the global fund for education in emergencies and protracted crises within the United Nations, Education Cannot Wait (ECW) puts teacher voices first in everything we do. Last year alone, we provided training to more than 100,000 teachers (59% women) on topics ranging from mental health, education in science, technology, engineering and math, gender-inclusion and disaster risk reduction. Approximately 60% of our investments active in 2023 supported teacher recruitment and/or financial assistance to retain teachers, with a focus on equity and inclusivity. This collective work reached a total of 5.6 million crisis-impacted children and adolescents in 2023.

In Nigeria, where approximately 18 million children are out of school, bold and brave teachers like Hafsat are making a real difference. In the Hajj Camp in Borno State, Hafsat and other teachers like her are providing education for girls and boys that were either the children of armed group members or may have been child soldiers themselves. In this wild corner of North-East Nigeria, children are born from conflict and live in constant fear of abduction, forced recruitment, enslavement and sexual exploitation.

Imagine the difference Hafsat can make in the lives of her students, her community and the world as a whole; as she puts it: “I love children, and I also believe that my line of work is important for peacebuilding.”

We face a number of challenges in mobilizing, training and supporting teachers, especially on the frontlines of armed conflicts, forced displacement, the climate crisis and other humanitarian catastrophes. According to recent analysis from our partners UNESCO, 44 million additional teachers are needed to achieve universal primary and secondary education by 2030.

With more funding we can provide cash incentives to support teachers in the war zones and climate disasters around the globe. Besides being affected themselves, we also have to empower them. We can train teachers like Hafsat to deal with the unique needs of children who have lived through the horrors of war and terror. We can build the policies and systems in countries to ensure gender-inclusive education and encourage pupils to turn their resilience into power.

And we can work collectively to ensure coordinated and synchronized support across the humanitarian-development-peace nexus to connect teachers, students and the communities they serve to deliver on a new social contract based on universal values and universal human rights. Today, we honor all teachers in the most difficult situations in the world. Now, we must act.

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By External Source
Oct 3 2024 (IPS-Partners)

 
Jeremy Hopkins is half Kenyan and half British and graduated with a MA in Arabic and Social Anthropology (Edinburgh) and a MSc in Development Studies (SOAS – University of London). He started his career with WFP in Somalia and then moved to UNICEF also in Somalia as a Child Protection specialist but with an overview on Youth, HIV and C4D portfolios. He worked again as a child protection specialist in Mozambique after which he was a Deputy Representative in Central African Republic, Yemen and Somalia (again!). He has been acting Representative in South Sudan for a short while, Representative in Burundi and is currently Representative in Egypt. Outside the professional realm Jeremy enjoys music, travelling, surfing and photography.

ECW: With more and more families crossing the border in Egypt to flee the brutal conflict in Sudan, the number of refugees and asylum seekers in Egypt is rapidly increasing. A majority are women and children. Why is it important to ensure these crisis-impacted girls and boys can continue their education?

Jeremy Hopkins: With over 725,000 registered refugees and asylum seekers—more than double from a year ago—there are now 246,000 school-aged refugee children in Egypt.

From my experience meeting some of these children, hearing their stories, their journeys, and their hopes for the future, I know that their dreams are just like any other child’s. They long for opportunities to learn, grow, build a better future, and contribute to their families and communities.

These children are incredibly resilient and driven. We must understand that many of these children have endured life-altering experiences – leaving their homes, facing dangerous and uncertain journeys, and now living in a country with language barriers and unfamiliar surroundings. Such displacement often leads to confusion, a loss of identity, and a sense of not belonging. Education becomes the lifeline that gives children a chance to navigate their new world after fleeing unimaginable hardship, helping them understand their circumstances, to develop a sense of self, and envision a hopeful future.

Every child, everywhere, no matter their circumstances, has the right to an education. Providing learning opportunities to refugee children in Egypt is not only about addressing their immediate needs – it’s about giving them the foundation to rebuild their lives. By investing in education for these children, we also help cultivate a more inclusive, harmonious environment for everyone involved including the host community children who can learn to celebrate diversity and difference. By supporting these children’s education, we’re ensuring they have the tools to survive, thrive, and contribute to the society they live in, now and in the future.

ECW: How is UNICEF working with education partners and multi-lateral funds in Egypt to support inclusive equitable quality education for refugees and host community children? What are the key challenges to address?

Jeremy Hopkins: UNICEF is committed to working with partners to build an inclusive, equitable and quality education system that ensures no child – whether refugee or host community – is left behind.

As the lead agency for Education in Emergencies, UNICEF is at the forefront of bridging short-term humanitarian responses with long-term development goals, creating a Humanitarian-Development Nexus.

A key component of our work is advocating with the Government of Egypt to make public education more accessible for refugees and migrants, whilst investing in these same national systems. We engage with policymakers at all levels to promote inclusive policies, ensuring that refugee children can attend public schools and receive the same educational opportunities as their Egyptian peers.

UNICEF also plays a key role in coordinating the education sector by co-chairing the Education Working Group and the Technical Task Team. These platforms allow us to bring together development partners to align efforts and maximize the impact of education initiatives, ensuring a streamlined approach that addresses the diverse needs of both refugee and host community children.

To support children directly, UNICEF has implemented education cash grants, benefiting over thousands of children and their families. We are also enhancing the quality of education in Sudanese Community Learning Centres by offering distance learning and digital resources through the UNICEF Learning Passport, which now has over 55,000 registered users.

Additionally, we have established a sustainable non-formal education model through ‘Learning Spaces’ within host community structures. These spaces provide immediate education responses and programme for integration in public schools for Sudanese, Palestinian, and Egyptian children. So far, more than 14,000 children have benefited from these programmes. We also launched a ‘Teaching Certification Programme’, which not only improves quality education but also creates employment opportunities for 250 refugee teachers.

UNICEF is also working closely with the Egyptian Government to integrate refugees and migrants into the formal public education system. We have mapped public schools that are already serving these students and are implementing a ‘Comprehensive Inclusion Programme’, positioning refugee and migrant children within the broader vulnerable population, alongside girls in rural areas, children at risk of dropping out, and children with disabilities. This inclusive approach has gained strong support from decision-makers because it addresses the needs of all at-risk children, not just refugees. In collaboration with the government and development partners, UNICEF promotes a holistic approach to inclusion, which maximizes impact, enhances cost-effectiveness, and ensures consistent implementation. So far, through these initiatives, we have reached 322,000 children, including 6,200 refugees and migrants, and 2,200 children with disabilities.

Despite significant efforts, several challenges persist in providing education for refugee children in Egypt. Approximately half of the 246,000 school-aged refugee children remain out of school, largely due to the lengthy waiting period for residency permits, which can extend up to 18 months. During this time, children are often unable to enroll in schools, and the additional registration requirements only compound the barriers they face in accessing education.

Strict enforcement of laws governing non-formal learning centres has also led to the closure of many community learning centres, which are crucial for over 150,000 children who rely on them for their education. Without these centres, the education of these children is at serious risk.

Another key challenge is the insufficient global support to address the escalating educational and other critical needs of refugees and migrants in Egypt. It is neither reasonable nor realistic to expect the Government of Egypt to shoulder the cost of integrating migrants and refugees into the national school system. Such responsibilities are shared with the international community and it is important for international development actors to step up with the much needed resources that are required for this work, in an environment where many refugees and migrants risk discrimination and an environment that is already under severe economic pressure

In the face of these challenges, UNICEF remains committed to work alongside the Egyptian Government and development partners to ensure that all children – regardless of their background – have access to inclusive, equitable and quality education. We believe that investing in education today is essential for building a more inclusive, resilient future for both refugee and host communities.

ECW: In your career with the United Nations, you have worked in Burundi, Yemen, Central African Republic, Mozambique, Somalia and other countries severely impacted by armed conflict, forced displacement, climate change and other protracted crises. Why should donors step up funding for Africa’s forgotten crises through multilateral funds such as Education Cannot Wait?

Jeremy Hopkins: Unfortunately, children and their families affected by such conflicts are among the most vulnerable in the world. They endure extreme poverty, severe protection vulnerabilities and they often lack access to basic services. These protracted crises are often overshadowed by more prominent global issues, yet the silent emergency of generations of children deprived of their right to education is a crisis in and of itself. Immediate relief and support are not just necessary—they are a humanitarian imperative.

Multilateral funds like Education Cannot Wait are particularly effective because they pool resources from various donors, ensuring that funds are used equitably, efficiently, and effectively. This collaborative approach maximizes impact and reduces duplication of efforts, ensuring that every dollar spent reaches those who need it most.

ECW: Globally, we are off-track to deliver on many of the goals outlined in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, including the target for universal education. How can we transform our delivery of humanitarian and development aid to fulfill our global commitments to children and adolescents caught in emergencies and protracted crises?

Jeremy Hopkins: Achieving universal 12 years of education by 2030 is a steep challenge and no more so for children and adolescents in emergencies and protracted crises. To get back on track with the SDG4 goals, we first need to reverse the declining trends of aid funding to education.

When it comes to humanitarian crises, education is often neglected for two principle reasons:

• Immediate Needs Prioritization: In crises, immediate needs like food, water, shelter and medical care take precedence. Education is sometimes seen as a secondary concern.
• Resource Constraints: Limited resources and funding often mean that education programmes are underfunded.

But education provides a platform for critical immediate needs and life-saving services. Schools are places to distribute clean water, provide nutrition and vital health services, and share life-saving messages. And when we listen to crisis-affected populations, education regularly tops the number one need. Why? Because education provides the immediate recovery platform for families and communities to build normalcy, to get children and adolescents focused on their mental health, learning, play and wellbeing, and to allow parents to plan for the next step. The learning environment also provides critical access to children who may be suffering from specific protection violations or vulnerabilities and who may need referral to specialist protection services.

As such, as per UNICEF’s Core Commitment for Children, education needs to be much better woven into the humanitarian response fabric so that the benefits of education can reach children and families from the earliest stages of crisis, and ruptures in learning can be averted, whilst critical mental health and psycho-social support and relief that learning offers can be expanded.

Additionally, innovative models of providing remote education based on the home country curriculum such as the Learning Passport, which is reaching over 60,000 children affected by crisis in Egypt – need to be scaled up.

ECW: We all know that ‘readers are leaders’ and that reading skills are key to every child’s education. What are three books that have most influenced you personally and/or professionally, and why would you recommend them to others?

Jeremy Hopkins: Let me offer three books that I have found personally inspirational, and which are, themselves, written by great leaders. I have to start with ‘The Long Walk to Freedom’ by Nelson Mandela. The incredible journey he travelled and his awesome capacity to forgive and reconcile are a life lesson to all of us. ‘The Dignity of Difference’ by Jonathan Sacks is another inspiring read which celebrates the importance of celebrating diversity in an increasingly globalized world. Finally ‘The Life of Pi’ by Yann Martel provides a heart-rending story of living through immense hardship and living to tell the tale. I have found each of these books a fascinating read and would return to them for reference or a re-read at any time. I hope that others will find them similarly inspiring.

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By Yasmine Sherif
NEW YORK, Sep 21 2024 (IPS)

The longing for peace transcends time, geography and religion. Based on justice, human rights and universal values outlined in the UN Charter, a culture of peace brings us all together in our common agenda for humanity. We can only co-exist by aligning ourselves with such a world order.

On today’s International Day of Peace, we call on world leaders to end conflict and embrace a culture of peace as enshrined in the UN Charter and related international law.

As the UN General Assembly outlined in the Declaration and Programme of Action on a Culture of Peace a quarter of a century ago, this must include: “Respect for life, human rights and fundamental freedoms; the promotion of non-violence through education, dialogue and cooperation; commitment to peaceful settlement of conflicts; and adherence to freedom, justice, democracy, tolerance, solidarity, cooperation, pluralism, cultural diversity, dialogue and understanding at all levels of society and among nations.”

Educating for peace starts at home and continues in school through years of education. This takes place during the most formative years of a child learning about their identity, ethics, values, conscience, courage and compassion. Wherever there has been a failure in imparting on children the imperative for peace, the world is turned upside down. This is a global failure with no geographical boundaries.

Today, we live in a world of unprecedented violence, armed conflict and chaos. All the genuine and heartfelt commitments made in 1945 in the UN Charter seem to be fading away. Children and adolescents are the most vulnerable, the least protected, and the most impacted. They bear the brunt.

Global conflicts killed three times as many children in 2023 than in the previous year, according to the United Nations. The number of forcibly displaced people reached an unprecedented 120 million in May 2024.

“In 2023, the United Nations verified a record 32,990 grave violations against 22,557 children in 26 conflict zones, a 35% increase from the previous year,” according to recent analysis by the UN.

We can end these violations and invest in a constructive co-existence globally. We can use our resources for education, rather than for wars. In classrooms around the world, girls and boys who have withstood the wrath of war can rebuild their hopes and their lives. Cultivating a culture of peace is possible. The financial resources exist. The choice as to how we use them is ours.

IPS UN Bureau

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Excerpt:

Ahead of the 3-year anniversary of ban on girls’ secondary education in Afghanistan.

By Yasmine Sherif
NEW YORK, Sep 17 2024 (IPS)

Today, we stand with solemn hearts as the world marks this week the three-year ban on girls’ secondary education in Afghanistan.

Today and every day, we must stand up for the millions of Afghan girls and women living under the yoke of gender-apartheid: systematized and institutionalized oppression, exclusion, and marginalization based exclusively on their gender. However, standing in solemnity for their suffering is not enough. We must act to remove the oppression and injustice. Against all odds, we must continue to deliver results to provide the girls access to an education well beyond grade sixth.

As a staunch champion for girls’ human rights, not the least the most foundational right – their right to an inclusive and continued quality education – Education Cannot Wait and our strategic partners call out to the world through our #AfghanGirlsVoices advocacy campaign. Together and collectively, we have brought together artwork and calls to action by global leaders, and conveyed the inspiring stories of hope, courage and resilience straight from Afghan girls and young women refusing to succumb to oppression and refusing to give up on their right to an education.

The quotes from Afghan girls are heart-breaking, poetic and passionate. Some resound with hope: “Every beat of my heart resounds with a rhythm of hope, pushing me forward in my quest of education despite all odds.” Others chart the abuse and fear that millions of girls face on a daily basis: “At just 14 years old, I became a bride, when I should have been in the ninth-grade learning and playing with my friends. Instead of holding a pencil, I held the weight of a marriage I never wanted.” Others are defiant: “In the face of adversity, my dreams become my armour, shielding me from doubt and empowering me to forge ahead towards knowledge.”

Celebrities, world leaders and passionate influencers continue to promote the #AfghanGirlsVoices campaign.

“The world must unite behind Afghan girls. Denying their right to education is a violation of the UN Charter, Convention on the Rights of the Child and basic human rights. Through the #AfghanGirlsVoices campaign, people everywhere can stand up for human rights and gender-justice by sharing their words of courage, hope and resilience,” said The Rt. Hon. Gordon Brown, UN Special Envoy for Global Education and Chair of ECW’s High-Level Steering Group.

As Khaled Hosseini, best-selling author of The Kite Runner, puts it: “Today, some three years after Afghan girls were banned from secondary education, 80% of school-aged Afghan girls and woman are out of school. Many are forced into unwanted marriage. This is a catastrophe, because denying Afghan girls access to school not only violates their human right to education and jeopardizes their future, it jeopardizes the future of the homeland as well.”

The pursuit of knowledge is a key tenant of Islam, and a key component in delivering on our universal promises of peace, equality and human rights. Education for all of Afghanistan’s daughters is essential to rebuilding this long-suffering nation.

Today, we ask world leaders everywhere to join ECW and our global strategic partners in calling for an end to the ban on education and to take action. We call on you to fund the ongoing education initiatives at the local level defying this illegal and irrational ban. Second, we call on you to resolve the catastrophe for the girls of Afghanistan stemming from ignorance rather than enlightenment. Afghanistan deserves better and it is urgent.

Yasmine Sherif is Executive Director of Education Cannot Wait

IPS UN Bureau

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