Education enables girls to fulfill their potential to transform their lives, families, and communities. Educated girls have better employment opportunities, marry later, and go on to have fewer, healthier children. Likewise, increasing girls’ access to education contributes to improved health, development, and economic growth.
In June, the United States government decided to leave the United Nations Human Rights Council. This decision ultimately brings forth different implications questioning the stance the US is choosing to take within the global arena regarding human rights. To protect human rights for all global citizens (including the right to quality education), it is critical now more than ever to uphold the dignity of the institutions we take membership in as opposed to abandon them outright.
GCE-US holds a Youth Advocacy Summit which gives youth advocates a platform to speak to their representatives to advocate for global education on Capitol Hill. The summit includes a training day with panelists from various coalition members within the Global Campaign for Education and a day of scheduled congressional meetings where the Youth Advocates can directly speak to their representatives about why access to quality education around the world matters to them. Read about my experience here.
The word “citizenship” often floods out of our mouths in hot contention. We like to pair it with words like "immigration” or “asylum seeker.” But when we’re not putting two and two together, citizenship is seldom heard. Although the definition of a citizen is incessantly questioned for those who lack the title, constituents like myself don’t often receive the same examination.
Learn about essential points and strategies proposed by leaders in global education such as Yasmine Sherif - director of Education Cannot Wait, UN High Commissioner Matthew Reynolds, and Meighan Stone - Senior Fellow for Women and Foreign Policy Program within the Council on Foreign Relations. Yasmine Sherif, Meighan Stone, and Matthew Reynolds speak to the escalating issue of providing quality education for children, especially girls, in crisis settings.
Yesterday, June 20, marked World Refugee Day, an opportunity to draw attention to the record 68.5 million people who are displaced around the world. The statistics are stark, but the resilience of refugees and others who are forcibly displaced is palpable as they journey to find safety, security and build a better future for themselves and their families.
According to UNHCR figures released this week, Syria continues to top the list of refugee-producing countries with more than 6 million individuals who have fled the country. Inside Syria, more than 6 million people are internally displaced and 13 million are in need of humanitarian assistance, including basic aid and protection.
Global Kids is wrapping up an incredible 2017-2018 academic year in which we worked with over 3000 youth leaders in New York City and Washington, DC! As an organization, we are committed to educating, activating, and inspiring youth from underserved communities to take action on critical issues facing our world today. For nearly 30 years, Global Kids has reached more than 150,000 young people and educators, harnessing and empowering leaders to demonstrate the values and attitudes of global citizens and to make change locally...Global Kids uses an approach to positive youth development that incorporates dynamic, interactive, culturally-relevant and inquiry-oriented workshops that meet young people where they are at and works with them to cultivate their knowledge of domestic and international politics, to strengthen their leadership skills and to increase their civic engagement.
It is often said that children and youth are the future. They are thought of in terms of their potential—to become the next leaders, peacebuilders, business gurus, and scientists. To realize their potential, quality education is vital, and a considerable amount of attention is given to how to achieve this outcome. With conversations on the topic coming to a fore, the World Bank this year even released its first ever World Development Report devoted entirely to education. The problem, however, is that this mindset often misidentifies youth as mere beneficiaries in the educational system, around which other components must cater and mold themselves, rather than as empowered change makers who play a critical role in shaping that system itself.
There is no clearer justification for youth engagement than when we consider the challenges facing global education. Unlike other issues contributing to extreme poverty, like health, famine/hunger and barriers facing girls and women, the education community has not had a ‘spotlight’ moment in the past 10 years and was almost relegated to the ‘decidedly un-sexy’ realm.
“As long as poverty, injustice and gross inequality persist in our world, none of us can rest”, said Nelson Mandela.
I often think about this quote as I reflect upon my life as a Syrian-Palestinian refugee and my work as an education advocate in Lebanon. Many milestones have been reached in global education, including the GPE Financing Conference in Dakar in February, with high level political commitments to education.
But from where I stand, as a young refugee seeking to realize my potential, the fight for education for all the children of the world is an uphill but worthy struggle." ~ Mahmoud Khalil, Youth Advocate for Global Partnership for Education
