Following the COP29 in Baku, the World Bank has issued a video, blogs, a press release and a report on how education can equip young people to address the climate catastrophe and the impact climate change already has on education.
“Education is a key asset for climate action. Education reshapes behaviors, develops skills, and spurs innovation—everything we need to combat the greatest crisis facing humanity.”
Watch the video, download the report, and read the blogs and the press releases.
In an editorial and an opinion piece for The New Humanitarian, it is argued that aid agencies and development organisations in the Global North fear speaking out about war crimes in Gaza and become thereby complicit in them.
The city of Benguerir in Morocco has been awarded the UNESCO Learning City Award 2024. It has received the prize for its transformative approach to lifelong learning, including its approach to creating inclusive educational opportunities for out-of-school learners and for children with disabilities.
The “Second-Chance School” focuses on equity and inclusion to support marginalised youth to re-enter the education system. For children with disability, the city has a specialised centre for non-verbal children to foster an inclusive education model. This model has achieved a 100% integration rate for nonverbal children in state schools, where they learn alongside their peers.
Save the Children has shared the analysis of their case management data which shows that 43% of children are suffering from psychosocial distress.
“The war in Ukraine is taking an increasingly heavy toll on children’s mental health with some developing speech defects and uncontrollable twitching, while others have terrible nightmares and scream in their sleep, according to Save the Children.”
In this feature, the UN Girls’ Education Initiative share how feminist leaders change education in the Sahel region:
“These young activists are not just participants — they are pioneers who play a crucial role in planning and implementing inclusive education policies.”
Read stories from Niger and Mali.
“GCI (Gender as the Centre Initiative) has started supporting the Feminist Youth Coalitions for Gender-Transformative Education — as part of the global youth-led network Transform Education. Their mission is to amplify the voices of young feminists in education decision-making, foster solidarity among gender activists, and integrate gender expertise rooted in lived experience into the education sector.”
Community groups and mutual aid networks in war-hit parts of Sudan have set up learning centres and safe spaces for children amid almost two years of disrupted schooling. Emergency response room volunteers said they have programmes that fund teachers to provide national curriculum lessons, and other projects that offer informal education as well as activities like art, sports, and music in child-friendly safe spaces.
“I can’t help but feel hopeful, seeing my children partake in these classes.” (Tarig, a parent)
Education Cannot Wait has published an interview with Richard Bennet, the UN Special Rapporteur on the Situation of Human Rights in Afghanistan:
“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.”
African education leaders have united to eliminate learning poverty in Africa by 2035. At the end of the 2024 Africa Foundational Learning Exchange (FLEX 2024), held in Kigali, Rwanda in November 2024, 22 Ministers of Education, and 12 Heads of Ministerial Delegations from 34 countries in Africa endorsed the African Union’s call to declare a ‘Decade of Education’. This aims to tackle the continent’s learning crisis. In her speech, First Lady of Rwanda, Mrs J. Kagame, asked:
“Should we fail to strengthen Foundational Learning and critical thinking, increase primary education completion rates, and allocate more resources to education, specifically to the more vulnerable learners, what is to be the long-term cost to the youth of this continent, their skills development, employability, and social welfare?”
Date: 5 December 2024.
Time: 14:00 – 15:00 GMT.
Location: Online.
The Centre for Lebanese Studies and the Research for Equitable Access and Learning (REAL) Centre at the University of Cambridge invite you to a webinar to launch a new report titled:
‘Education Under Fire: A Rapid Study of Parents’ and Teachers’ Readiness for School Amidst Israeli Attacks on Lebanon’
The event will include a presentation of the report. Speakers will be confirmed soon.
This report is part of a series on the impact of war on education in the Middle East.
UNHCR issued the mid-year report about the Refugee Response Plan for Sudan in June 2024, but the situation has not improved. A recent news article by Education Cannot Wait wrote:
“With millions of people fleeing the brutal conflict, hunger and atrocities in Sudan, the education system in the neighboring state of Chad is reaching the breaking point. Since April 2023, over 629,000 refugees have entered the country, along with over 200,000 Chadian returnees.” The Chad plan received only 23% funding by November 2024. The overall plan had only received 19% of funding in June 2024.
The underfunding of the response plan impacts all neighbouring states and the services they can deliver to the refugees, especially children. For example “Egypt: 74,570 school-aged refugee children are not enrolled in schools and approximately 5,380 unaccompanied and separated children and children with special needs are not reached with educational programmes, denying them the specialized support they require for their development and well-being.”
