The global indicator for SDG 4.2.1, the goal focused on early childhood, is the “percentage of children under 5 years of age who are developmentally on track in health, learning and psychosocial well-being.”The most recent SDG 4 Data Digest from UNESCO evaluates progress against creating the right measures for this and clearly identifies that we “need a definition of developmentally on track.”
HakiElimu, a Tanzanian CSO working since 2001 to see an open, just, and democratic Tanzania, where all people enjoy the right to education that promotes equity, creativity, and critical thinking, is directing research-based advocacy to support girls’ education. Through the Right to Education Index (RTEI) (www.rtei.org), HakiElimu found that girls’ expulsion from school because of pregnancy is not only legal but also commonplace in Tanzania.
The #MeToo movement, which took the world by storm last year gave women a platform to discuss the abuse or injustices that they have experienced in their lives. For many young women and girls it has been an opportunity to speak out and demand change. But which voices are still silent and who do we still need to listen to?
Please call on your Members of Congress to support the Global Partnership for Education and promote continued US investment in education for the world’s most marginalized children.
The truth is that a highly qualified teacher in a positive school culture can support students to leapfrog grade levels and provide relational and social support. These teachers are invaluable and must be invested in, so that they will continue to grow and will themselves invest in thousands of children throughout their careers.
buildOn is a nonprofit with a mission to break the cycle of poverty, illiteracy, and low expectations through service and education by building schools in seven of the economically poorest countries in the world. Schools are constructed in true partnership with local communities and in villages that historically haven’t had an adequate school structure. Community members pledge to send girls to the new school in equal numbers to boys, and local men and women are given equal leadership opportunities in project management and construction. buildOn has altered the lives of hundreds of people, including children like Elizabeth.
Learning the sciences enhances a student’s success and has a powerful impact in particular on girls. Africa Schoolhouse recently raised funds to assist communities in Tanzania to add three new science laboratories and sanitary composting latrines in secondary schools.
Bidil Abdulahi has experienced joy and heartbreak in his attempt to send his children to school.
Every day, Bidil Abdulahi would farewell his oldest son, sent off on a one hour walk to the nearest school. “It was a long walk for a child,” he says, “but I didn’t want my child to be as illiterate as I am.”
The decision paid off, with his son Yunus now in college.
Bidil’s daughter was not as fortunate.
A few months ago I met a grandmother.
That’s not so remarkable, until I tell you that she is only 25.
No matter how you calculate the math and circumstances that result in a young lady becoming a grandmother at age 25, it is horrific. There is no instant panacea that will make instances like this history. In this particular case, I can point to a long civil war, with its attendant atrocities, as well as child marriage, poverty, and other factors as contributory, but I really started the story this way to make the point that in our drive for accurate statistics with which to make decisions, we must never lose sight of the fact that those statistics point to real people, with real stories, and with very real barriers to overcome.
My father-in-law squinted. “Why on earth would you want to do that?” he said when I told him I was going to a remote part of Zambia to produce a virtual reality experience for Impact Network, the NGO I work for in New York.
Impact Network runs education programs in rural, off-the-grid communities in Africa. I explained that virtual reality, or VR, would allow us to tell our story in the most immersive way possible. Short of bringing people to Zambia, the experience would transport them to a rural village where they could explore the sights and sounds of a new environment. This would help people to better understand the context and purpose of Impact Network’s work and maybe even want to visit themselves.
