Archive for category: Education

Information and stories on education.

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Real Change from the Education 2030 Framework for Action

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The Education 2030 Framework for Action (FFA) was adopted and launched at a meeting held alongside the 38th UNESCO General Conference at the organization’s headquarters on Nov. 4.

Governments and private sector investors from around the world agreed to support the FFA, committing to make the Education 2030 agenda a success by 2030.

The FFA is designed as a consultation program, working alongside government education organizations. The program intends to keep educational stakeholding on track toward achieving the 2030 Education agenda.

UNESCO’s Director-General Irina Bokova said that she is hopeful that the FFA will help to encourage and enforce the four principles of the Agenda: the universal right to quality free and compulsory education; the acknowledgement that education is a public responsibility; the importance of providing adults with lifelong learning opportunities; and that gender equality is paramount.

“The conviction guiding our policy is that inequality is not a matter of fate,” said Director-General Bokova. “We have the responsibility to act to ensure that students’ background does not determine their educational prospects and future opportunities.”

But the FFA is concerned with more than students’ test scores and attendance. The program is intended to create a foundation for global citizenship, peace promotion, human dignity and tolerance.

Through using education as a holistic and inspirational medicine, UNESCO is hoping that Education 2030 will improve global educational prospects.

UNESCO was not alone in the unveiling of the FFA, partnering with the powerful co-convenors of Education 2030, including the United Nations Development Programme, the United Nations Populations Fund, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, the United Nations Children’s Fund, the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women, and the World Bank.

But the Director-General Bokova acknowledged that it’s going to take more than a list of big-name supporters to make the FFA a success. It’s going to take a serious financial commitment from individual governments.

“This calls for new funding, to bridge the annual U.S. $40 billion funding gap, to invest where needs are most acute. We need every country to meet the target of allotting six percent of Gross Domestic Product to education,” said Director-General Bokova. “We need to reach the overall goal of directing 0.7 percent of all Official Development Assistance to education. To leave no one behind, we need more investment and smarter investment, backed by stronger policies.”

President of the World Bank Group Jim Yong Kim added to Director-General Bokova’s point, saying, “To end poverty, boost shared prosperity, and achieve the Sustainable Development Goals, we must use development financing and technical expertise to effect radical change. We must work together to ensure that all children have access to quality education and learning opportunities throughout their lives, regardless of where they are born, their gender, or their family’s income.”

– Claire Colby

Sources: UNESCO, Women of China
Photo: Flickr

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Eradicating the Guinea Worm Disease

guinea-worm-carter-comic-book-horizontal-large-galleryBack in 1999, Nigerian farmer Abdullahi Rabiu faced an agonizing reality. An estimated 84 worms, narrow in form and each of them two to three feet in length, had painfully ruptured through his skin. And there was nothing he could do to stop it.

Rabiu, who eventually recovered from the ordeal, contracted a waterborne parasitic disease called Guinea Worms by drinking contaminated pond water.

It’s a cycle: an infected person seeks relief from the painful rupturing of the worms by entering the water. There, the worms release hundreds of thousands of larvae. The larvae are then eaten by tiny water flies barely visible to the human eye. Finally, people who drink from that pond run the risk of consuming the flies and becoming infected with the worm.

In 1986, an estimated 3.5 million cases of guinea worm were reported across 21 countries in Africa and Asia. Since then, the Carter Center, founded by former President Jimmy Carter, has led an international campaign to eradicate the disease.

And they are winning.

After visiting more than 26,300 villages, mostly in sub-Saharan Africa, and training people in health education, the eradication of the guinea worm is not only possible — it’s in sight. Between Jan. 1 and Aug. 31 of this year, only 15 cases were reported across four countries.

“The potential for disease eradication to permanently improve quality of life worldwide is tremendous,” said Dr. Donald Hopkins, vice president for Carter Center health programs. Once a disease that incapacitates people like Rabiu is eradicated, the health of individuals improve and economies benefit from increased productivity.

Eradication of the guinea worm would make it the first human disease to have been wiped out since smallpox in 1980. It stands to be the first disease to be eliminated without a vaccine or medicine.

In the case of guinea worms, the key was as simple as education. People in these communities have learned to filter water, making it safe for drinking. Those who have become infected know not to enter the water.

While it is impossible to predict exactly when guinea worms will be completely eradicated, there is hope to see it gone in the next two to three years at the latest.

Now facing terminal cancer, Jimmy Carter was recently asked what he would like to accomplish before dying. His response: “I would like the last guinea worm to die before I do.”

– Kara Buckley

Sources: The Carter Center 1, BBC 1, BBC 2, The Carter Center 2, The Carter Center 3
Photo: CNN

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Read to Feed: Global Education Lesson Plans

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Anyone and everyone can change the world, even in the slightest way. An organization known as Read to Feed gives children the opportunity to make a difference in the lives of families living in poverty.

The program encourages childhood reading while raising awareness of extreme global poverty in young minds. Read to Feed teaches and informs students of the realities of malnutrition and poverty, inspiring them to help those in need and providing an educational incentive to do so.

Here’s how it works: A child chooses a sponsor for each book he or she reads during a period of time set by his or her Read to Feed leader. The sponsor agrees to provide a certain amount of money for each book read or hour spent reading. Then, after the books have been read and the funds collected, the child chooses an animal through Heifer International to give to a family experiencing poverty.

Heifer International is an organization dedicated to ending global poverty and world hunger. Heifer provides families in impoverished communities with livestock and training to combat malnutrition as well as build a sustainable lifestyle.

Furthermore, Heifer encourages the families they have helped to share the training they receive with other families in their communities and pass on the first female offspring of their livestock to another family in need, thus creating a cycle of sustainability that has the power to lift entire communities out of poverty.

The wide variety of livestock provides families with meat, milk, wool and manure to grow their own agriculture. Kids can participate in Read to Feed individually or in groups; however, the program most often takes place in a classroom setting.

Furthermore, Heifer provides Global Education Lesson Plans so that teachers can inform students of the realities of global poverty and the impact that they can make in changing its course.

Read to Feed ultimately provides children with a way to make a difference in many lives. Reading a book is a fun incentive to end extreme poverty, both stimulating a child’s mind by increasing the number of books they read, and their knowledge of the world. Anyone can make a difference and everyone– no matter what age– deserves the chance to try.

– Sarah Sheppard

Sources: Heifer 1, Heifer 2, Learning to Give
Photo: Hiefer International

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Social Entrepreneurs in Education Are Making An Impact

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Entrepreneurs are individuals that go beyond the status quo in order to make change happen. “They pursue poverty alleviation goals with entrepreneurial zeal, business methods and the courage to innovate and overcome traditional practices,” says the Schwab Foundation for Social Entrepreneurs.

Reform and change are never made without a struggle. Social entrepreneurs in education are no different.

Many struggle with receiving the support and funding necessary to keep programs running. But despite hardships, they press forward in order to make improvements.

Occasionally, an entrepreneur will find a break in the form of investors. Schwab, Skoll and Ashoka are three such foundations that provide this relief to individuals making change happen around the world.

One such fellow, or entrepreneur, that found relief works for an organization by the name of abcdespanol. Based in Colombia, the organization worked to create a new methodology for teaching reading, writing and math skills.

Javier Gonzalez discovered that the issues across Latin America were not due to the people, but the methodology while playing a game of dominoes. “González then created abcdespañol and “ABC de la Matematica”, an innovative learning solution employing games as a teaching methodology.”

For many, this is how it works. Social entrepreneurs in education see an issue and then fight to find and put into practice new ideas to correct the issue. The journey doesn’t stop there, though.

Going back to Javier, “he continued searching for additional ways to make the learning process more interesting.”

Education isn’t an easy fix and is not a one solution fits all circumstance ordeal. Teaching the world’s future leaders takes innovation and improvement. Social entrepreneurs, like Javier, know this and continue to seek out a better way.

Ashoka fellow Flick Asvat of South Africa is another excellent example of this.

In the country of South Africa, Asvat found that many youths become more discouraged than not by the truism that education is the path out of poverty due to the strikes, violence, and other issues that have continuously interrupted such attempts.

To fight this, “Flick is putting children in control of their own out-of-school educational programs. She has developed a concept, Bugrado, based on the idea that human beings have the power to change their circumstances.”

Through innovative new techniques, real change was seen in schools. “Flick has successfully created five pilot programs around Johannesburg and is now focusing on Alexandra Township, where the program is operating in four schools, reaching approximately six thousand students.”

As a social entrepreneur in education, Flick resigned from her job as Minister of Education to solely focus on the implementation of the Bugrado program.

Such stories have become increasingly common. Through simply opening one’s eyes and caring about making a difference, individuals have made change happen. When one thing doesn’t work, new ones are tried. In this way, education is constantly improving.

Jeff Skoll, Founder and Chairman of the Skoll Foundation has expressed the importance of these social entrepreneurs around the world.

On their site, it is stated that it has become, “the premier global event for social entrepreneurship…the Forum has increasingly become a showcase to highlight large scale impact that social entrepreneurs are having on the big challenges facing the planet.”

By connecting social entrepreneurs with the resources and connections they need to improve conditions, the Skoll Foundation helps millions experience the impact of positive change.

In short, these entrepreneurs are alike in a fundamental thought process. As Skoll puts it, “I believe “a lot of good comes from a little bit of good,” or, in other words, where the positive social returns significantly outstrip the amount of time and money invested.”

– Katherine Martin

Sources: Schwab Found 1, Schwab Found 2, Ashoka, Skoll
Photo: Wikimedia

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Zimbabwe Education System Improves

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According to recent statistics provided to UNICEF by the Zimbabwe Ministry of Education, about 2 million children are attending school throughout the country.

However, despite this seemingly good news, the classroom environment provided in the Zimbabwe education system suffers from a chronic lack of funding. In many classrooms throughout the country, they go without the proper facilities, materials and supplies for students to learn. In addition, the Zimbabwe education system’s curriculum is considered unbalanced and leaves students unprepared for higher education.

In response to this crisis in education, in 2013 the government of Zimbabwe instituted a series of reforms to revitalize the education system, including a review and overhaul of the curriculum.

An article titled “Education: Literacy is not enough,” published by the Zimbabwe Independent in 2014, states that the country maintains a literacy rate of approximately 90 percent, making the people of Zimbabwe among the most learned African scholars.

However, despite the growing literacy rate in Zimbabwe, very few people pass the national exams. The Ordinary Level Exams are the country’s measure of competence – roughly the equivalent of high school exit exams.

As seen in a report by UNESDOC, the United Nations Development goals for Zimbabwe for 2013-2015 show that education is a clear priority for development. The UN’s goals for the education system in Zimbabwe are to:

  1. Stabilize the teaching force
  2. Increase participation in education and training
  3. Increase participation in higher education and tertiary schools

But challenges remain. A story published by National Public Radio recounts the tale of a 14-year-old girl who was held back from attending school because of the fees. Government schools charge about $40 to $90 per child to attend. In poorer areas of the country, the families just cannot afford it.

An article by the African Report has the dropout rate at roughly 43 percent of students, forced out of school because they cannot not pay the government fees. This amounts to about 13,000 students in Zimbabwe last year.

Finding qualified teachers is yet another significant obstacle for the education system in Zimbabwe.

The United Nations is working closely with the government of Zimbabwe to help rectify these issues. The international community through the United Nations is committing $166.2 million to ensure that primary school children receive a proper education.

– Robert Cross

Sources: African Economist, Education Zimbabwe, The African Report, The Independent, United Nations 1, United Nations 2, UNICEF
Photo: African Economist

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Global Education Industry Summit Challenges Education

Global Education Industry Summit Challenges Education Systems

The First Global Education Industry Summit brought together education policy makers and education-related industry leaders to exchange ideas on how education has evolved and revealed strategies for innovation.

Held in Helsinki, Finland on Oct. 19 and 20, the summit was the ideal location because Finland is known for its strong education system.

“Finland’s education system is well regarded worldwide for its teacher education approach, and for the status that the teaching profession enjoys,” said Education Minister Hekia Parata.

The summit was jointly organized by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), the European Commission (EC) and the Finnish Ministry of Education and Culture.

During the summit, Finland’s Minister of Education and Culture Sanni Grahn-Laasonen discussed the importance of social change and how this correlates with keeping children in school and continuing their education.

“We need to challenge our education systems in order to keep up with current social change and expectations to encourage people to learn continuously,” said Grahn-Laasonen.

Since the digital era has made an immense impact on education, Finland announced it will introduce a new national curriculum emphasizing digital skills in August 2016.

Ranked fifth in the world for education, Finland also desires to place more emphasis on phenomenon-based learning.

Instead of passively receiving information from teachers in traditional subject learning, students have the opportunity to work alongside teachers to develop projects while taking responsibility for their own learning.

Phenomenon-based learning also deals with the incorporation of modern technology, in particular, online instruction and game-based learning.

Through these strategies, Finland hopes to prepare its students for the evolving demands of higher education and an ever-changing workforce.

“One of the common themes of the discussions was how much education systems can learn from each other, but it is also important to recognize that each system is particular to its own culture and society,” says Minister Parata.

While the next summit will be held in Israel in 2016, representatives and international organizations hope education reforms will trigger more students to receive the education they deserve to succeed.

– Alexandra Korman

Sources: Noodle, Ranking America, Scoop, Xinhua Net
Photo: Flickr

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The Rising Potential For “The Educational Journey of a Girl”

“Over 31 million primary school-age girls are out of school despite progress in achieving universal primary education,” a report published by the Global Business Coalition for Education found.

This study was released on the International Day of the Girl Child, a time “to recognize girls’ rights and the unique challenges girls face around the world,” says the UN.

The study produced an infographic and report which followed a female’s educational journey from birth to adulthood, offering insight into the obstacles faced by many seeking an education.

The infographic illustrated many of the disadvantages girls must overcome but, due to their circumstances, may be unable to. For example, a child born to a literate mother is five times more likely to survive beyond the age of 5.

However, girls who start engaging in child labor tend to be between 5-7 years old and few of them are given the opportunity of enrolling in school, which means millions never make it.

While the study recognizes that many businesses already do a great deal to empower girls in secondary education, the report encouraged companies to begin making investments at an earlier age.

“Examining the wider life cycle of a girl and investing sooner would have economic and societal benefits and help companies to support girls to become the leaders, consumers, employees, employers and innovators of the future,” says A World at School, a global campaign working to place all children in school.

After surveying 32 companies that invest in girls, the report discovered that early support in a child’s education is more helpful and transformative because it aids in building foundations in subjects, such as numeracy and literacy, which could advance them later in life.

The study suggests that the key to enabling more girls to receive an education lies in early investment; starting early will help prepare them with the necessary skills they will need to advance at work and in life.

In fact, the infographic also revealed that girls who complete both primary and secondary education “are likely to earn income, have fewer unwanted pregnancies, and break the poverty cycle.”

To build a more involved and sustainable role in girls’ educational development, the report has issued the following recommendations:

  1. Build broad-based partnerships
  2. Invest now, invest early
  3. Expand the business case for girl’s education
  4. Grow the evidence base
  5. Strengthen the corporate voice for girl’s education
  6. Play an active role in addressing the global crisis
  7. Make the health and education link for girls
  8. Train the next generation of employees and business leaders
  9. Work with the international donor community to scale what works in girl’s education

For many children’s education, their only hope rests in receiving support during their early years. As Executive Chair of GBC-Education Sarah Brown said, “We know all too well that the economic empowerment of a woman does not start when she is an adult. It starts when she is a girl.”

– Nikki Schaffer

Sources: A World at School, UN
Photo: A World at School

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International Scholarships: Hope for Developing Countries

International Scholarships: Hope for Developing Countries

Nelson Mandela, former president of South Africa and education advocate, once stated that “education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.”

It is with this outlook that countries have banded together to make education a priority in developing countries where change is most needed.

Primary education and ensuring that each child has access to it has been a first step, but what next? USAID along with several other countries and organizations have begun expanding their focus on continued education.

On the USAID site, it explains that “higher levels of education can raise developing countries’ productivity significantly. One study shows that an additional year of average secondary or university-level education in a country raises national output by 19 percent.”

The U.N. News Center showed this in its report on economic growth within developing countries. Its feature article shared, “Economic growth alone does not automatically translate into human development progress. [Developing countries] are therefore not just tapping into global trade, but they are also improving health and education services, which have allowed them to sustain their growth.”

Countries such as the U.S., U.K. and Poland have helped to expand educational opportunities through international scholarships.

Go Poland is one project that has helped more than 400 international students continue their education outside of their home country.

On its site, the organization notes that “new scholarship programmes translate into higher numbers of foreigners studying in Poland. Foreign students in Poland acquire expertise which they will be able to use afterwards for the benefit of their home countries.”

The same goals are maintained in all other international scholarships awarded to students from developing countries. It is an investment in the students, developing countries and the world at large.

Future scholarships for 2016 are already being handed out to students in various developing nations. These scholarships provide hope for a better future in countries that still have much room for growth.

– Katherine Martin

Sources: Washington Post, USAID, UN, Polska Pomoc
Photo: Pixabay

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Creating Ways to Continue Education Despite War and Conflict

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Elementary school is a time that is remembered by new backpacks and the smell of fresh pencils and erasers. Small children proudly sport new outfits and seek out new friends in various classes.

This is the idealized picture of what a small proportion of the world’s children is able to enjoy. In war-torn developing countries, though, elementary schools look very different.

A recent article from The Guardian found that “Almost 50 million children and young people living in conflict areas are out of school, more than half of them primary age, and reports of attacks on education are rising.”

Multiple studies done over the years have found that when it comes to war, education is one of the first casualties. War and other such conflicts cause damage to buildings, displaced families, necessary certificates to be lost, and a change in priorities.

While this is often the case, new programs are springing up that provide access to school even amidst such turmoil.

UNICEF, for instance, has been working with the Ministry of Education to find solutions.

In an article focused on Yemen, the UNICEF site stated that they are, “working with the Government to help organize catch-up classes for those who have missed their education and encourage as many children as possible to return to school for the new school year.”

The combined efforts of UNICEF and the Ministry of Education have also worked to help children take exams that were missed due to schools being closed during the fighting.

War Child is another organization that has been working in several war-torn countries to improve education despite war and conflict.

On their site they shared, “In Afghanistan we’re providing education for the street children who use our drop-in-centres. We’ve also opened 20 Early Childhood Development Centres to provide 620 children aged 4-6 with a pre-school education.”

Similar work is being done in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Iraq, Uganda and Syria.

These programs allow for children to receive the education that is needed to help end the cycle of poverty in these developing nations despite the negative impacts of war.

– Katherine Martin

Sources: The Guardian, UNICEF, War Child
Photo: Google Images

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Smartphones Affect Education Gaps in Rural Pakistan

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Throughout rural Pakistan, many teachers don’t have access to quality educational training for a variety of reasons, including cost, distance and family commitments.

Online distance learning could easily fill-in these educational gaps, but limited Internet coverage has proven to be a stumbling block for educators and students alike.

Developments in Literacy (DIL), a nonprofit founded by Pakistani-Americans in order to bring quality education to disadvantaged children in underdeveloped regions, has created a revolutionary solution to end this problem.

Funded by USAID, DIL created a mobile distance learning program known as mLearning. The parameters of the program were straightforward. Teachers were each given a smartphone with video lessons loaded onto them, giving teachers unlimited access to the material.

Once a month, teachers would meet at one of the 23 WiFi hubs DIL established throughout the nations to download more training videos. The 8- to 10-minute videos cover a variety of techniques to engage and inspire students to love learning, especially math and English.

Although the program’s focus is on bettering the understanding of school subjects and the teaching ability of rural educators, the end-game is to inspire children to stay in school. The goal is to have smartphones affect education gaps in rural Pakistan.

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The average number of years that Pakistani children stay in school is only eight years, with most dropping out before age 16. This low level of academic participation has capped the Pakistani literacy rate at 57 percent, with only 45 percent literacy for women.

Because of this, mLearning is aimed at improving the education and opportunities of poor children and at-risk rural girls through better teacher training and learning resources.

During the course of the initial mLearning program, 200 teachers were given smartphones and completed the program from January 2013 to November 2014. Currently, more than 5,000 children benefit from being taught by teachers who have participated in mLearning.

Since the end of mLearning, the educational aid videos have been shared with 40 schools not affiliated with DIL, and countless teachers have shared the videos personally from their smartphones.

That’s the real brilliance behind mLearning using smartphones as its method of delivery. Since DIL owns the majority of the content, teachers are able to share the videos freely.

mLearning’s results thus far have been impressive. Across the board, teachers reported a 30 percent increase in their English skills and a 40 percent increase in their comprehension of mathematics. As the mLearning videos continue to be spread around, DIL is looking to expand the program.

– Claire Colby

Sources: USAID, World Factbook
Photo: USAID
Photo: The Hindu.Com