Education Cannot Wait: Annual Results Report - Press Conference

Education Cannot Wait: Annual Results Report - Press Conference | United Nations

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Press conference by Yasmine Sherif, Executive Director of Education Cannot Wait (ECW) on ECW's Annual Results Report.
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A new Education Cannot Wait (ECW) Results Report highlights significant learning outcomes achieved for children and adolescents in crisis settings and calls for urgent additional donor support to meet the rapidly escalating needs.
The global community is falling behind on its promise to ensure ‘quality education for all’ by 2030. Armed conflicts, forced displacement, climate change, and other emergencies and protracted crises have left more than 224 million crisis-affected children in urgent need of education support, a sharp rise from 75 million in 2016.
Despite these growing needs, funding for education in emergencies and protracted crises dropped for the first time in a decade, according to Education Cannot Wait’s ‘Results Against All Odds: 2023 Annual Results Report’, launched today in New York.
Yasmine Sherif, Executive Director of the organization spoke to reporters today (17 Sep) in New York.
She reiterated, “We use the United Nations humanitarian and the resident coordinator system. We work in close partnership with the education Ministries. We work with all our encounter partners in the UN system, in the communities, in the civil society, in the teachers’ associations. So through joint programming, you can reach and keep reaching more because the system is established.”
The Executive Director added that 80 percent of ECW’s investments have led to academic improvements that are by tests. Seventy-two percent shows significant improvements in children’s social and emotional learning, “meaning also healing through the mental health and psycho-social services provided,” she added.
Education Cannot Wait (ECW), the global fund for education in emergencies and protracted crises within the United Nations, and its strategic partners continue to defy the odds, delivering life-saving, life-sustaining and multi-year investments in education to the world’s most vulnerable children and adolescents.
Since ECW became operational in 2017, its investments have reached 11 million children and adolescents, including 5.6 million girls and boys in 2023 alone. This reach is unprecedented. Yet, much more resources are needed to meet the needs of the over 224 million children, adolescents and their teachers in need of urgent support.
To date, the Fund has mobilized more than US$1.6 billion from public and private donors. However, $600 million urgently needs to be mobilized in donor contributions for ECW and its strategic partners to reach a total of 20 million children and adolescents with inclusive, quality education by the end of its 2023-2026 strategic plan period.
On the impact of climate change on education, Sherif said, “climate induced disasters have nearly doubled in 2022, there were 14 percent and into in 2023, just one year later, 27 precent directly impacting education.”
She also said, “By investing in building schools that are resilient to a flood or another form of climate disasters, earthquake, by investing in curriculum to teach children how to manage Mother Earth in their societies, you can help prevent it.”
The Executive Director concluded that education is the best vehicle for climate prevention.