Teach for All: Strengthening the Global Education Ecosystem to foster Education For All

On April 20, 2017, Teach For All and the Center for Universal Education at the Brookings Institution co-hosted a roundtable following the recommendation included in the Education Commission’s Learning Generation report, which calls for more concerted support and investment in a global education ecosystem. The roundtable gathered over 40 experts from global civil society organizations, social enterprises, bilateral and multilateral organizations, corporations, global philanthropies, research organizations, and think tanks, including Daniel Stoner, Co-Chair of the Basic Education Coalition and Associate Vice President for Education and Child Protection, Save the Children and Suezan Lee, Education Finance Specialist, USAID, in Washington D.C..

During the discussion, participants explored how a global ecosystem has led change in the health sector, discussed key opportunities and challenges for global education, and collectively identified actions to move the Learning Generation report recommendation forward. Participants agreed to:

1. Create a shared understanding of what we mean by a global education ecosystem—what its characteristics are and why is it important; 
2. Discuss what is needed to help strengthen it—where are the gaps and opportunities, and in particular, what key global public goods help to facilitate cross-border learning and capacity building of local stakeholders; and 
3. Identify initial next steps that we might take collectively to help increase support for and investments in the development of global public goods, including an infrastructure for fostering local capacity to adapt, learn, and share.

Experts are hoping to convene again in September around the 72nd session of the United Nations General Assembly in New York and in November at the The WISE Summit in Doha.

Teach For All alongside many other global education stakeholders looks forward to continuing to collaborate on these actions as the global education sector works toward achieving the Sustainable Development Goal 4 of ensuring inclusive and quality education for all by 2030. With this strengthened foundation, we hope that collectively we can advocate for increased investment in education, allocate funding more efficiently, and create an environment that encourages sharing best practices across borders. 

Teach For All is a global network of 45 independent, locally led and governed partner organizations and a global organization that works to accelerate the progress of the network. Each network partner recruits and develops promising future leaders to teach in their nations’ high-need schools and communities and, with this foundation, to work with others, inside and outside of education, to ensure all children are able to fulfill their potential. 

Teach For All network partners currently have over 14,000 placed teachers in low-income communities across 45 countries, and 65% of its more than 55,000 alumni are working in education or with disadvantaged communities.

Save the Children: Transforming Health and Education in Guatemala’s Western Highlands

In August 2016, I had the privilege of visiting Save the Children’s IDEA project in Guatemala with Jonathan Cordone, the then Deputy Undersecretary of the US Department of Agriculture (USDA).

IDEA is a USDA project funded through the McGovern-Dole Food for Education Program. IDEA is one example of the many international humanitarian and development programs that would be a casualty of the President’s drastic proposal to cut U.S. international affairs funding by roughly one-third.

The justification for the cut was that the program lacks evidence that it is being effectively implemented to reduce food insecurity, but our Guatemala program shows that it is indeed making a difference in the lives of children.

Guatemala’s Western Highlands
In the Guatemalan Western Highlands, more than 60% of indigenous children are stunted and more than half are malnourished.  Through the IDEA project, Save the Children feeds more than 43,000 school age children per year, directly addressing food insecurity in the most impoverished region of Guatemala.

A recent independent evaluation of the IDEA program indicated that as a result of the school meals, absenteeism in program schools dropped from 20% to 5% in less than 2 years.[1]  The same evaluation found the number of children who now pay attention in class increased by 40%.  When asked why more children were paying attention in class, teachers said “They are no longer hungry.”

The McGovern-Dole Program
The McGovern-Dole program goes beyond just feeding children who otherwise would not have, in many cases, even one nutritious meal a day.  It integrates health, nutrition, and education interventions that enable children to reach their full potential.   The IDEA program has transformed barren cinderblock classrooms into engaging environments (as seen below) designed to cultivate children’s curiosity and encourage their love of learning. As a result of the USDA McGovern-Dole program, these children have learned to read in two languages: the indigenous K’iche’ language and Spanish.

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Cambridge Education: Changing girls' lives in South Sudan

Photo Credit: Ashley Hamer

A new film showcases how UK aid is transforming the lives of a generation of girls in the world’s newest nation.

In South Sudan, conflict and ingrained stigmas surrounding girls’ education are hindering long-term development. Despite insecurity, economic collapse and logistical struggles, the UK aid-funded Girls’ Education South Sudan (GESS) programme is continuing to successfully deliver its aim of educating the country’s poorest and most vulnerable girls, transforming their lives through education.

In the last three years, GESS has reached over 3500 schools, with more than 9000 grants funding classrooms, latrines, books and much more. Over 300,000 cash transfers have been paid to more than 180,000 girls, while two million people have been reached through radio programmes aimed at changing the negative socio-cultural attitudes towards educating girls.

Even during the worsening crisis, GESS has already received reports from more than 2500 schools in 2017 about how cash transfers and grants are helping them to stay open, increase their enrolment numbers and boost attendance rates despite the violent conflict.

“Inspire. Educate. Transform.”, which features girls benefiting from GESS, premiered at the UK Houses of Parliament on 29 March and shows the remarkable progress the programme has made in keeping girls in school and helping them learn. At a time when the social fabric of South Sudan is under maximum pressure, education can do more than mend the damage caused by conflict, it can provide essential building blocks for long-term development.

Cambridge Education is leading the implementation of the GESS programme with its partners BBC Media Action, Charlie Goldsmith Associates, and Winrock International, on behalf of the Department for International Development.