Act for Humanity, Act for Education

On World Humanitarian Day, Education Cannot Wait calls for strengthened global solidarity to empower local communities to deliver life-building, life-sustaining quality education for all.

The world is watching. As we mark this year’s World Humanitarian Day, Education Cannot Wait (ECW) is calling on world leaders to strengthen our investments in the teachers, frontline aid workers, communities and other local delivery partners that are working tirelessly to provide girls and boys caught in the world’s most devastating humanitarian crises with life-building quality education.

Attacks on education – and education workers – continue with impunity. From 2020 to 2023, there were over 11,000 recorded attacks on education, according to GCPEA. In all, over 19,000 students and educators were harmed. According to the Aid Workers Security Report, the ten most dangerous contexts in the world for humanitarian aid workers (in order of severity) include Gaza, Sudan, South Sudan, Nigeria, Lebanon, Ukraine, Ethiopia, Somalia, Syria and Democratic Republic of the Congo.

This is precisely where ECW investments are delivering the lifeline of a quality education for girls and boys who have seen their villages burned to the ground, their loved ones killed, and their hopes for the future ripped away by the compounding challenges of armed conflict, forced displacement, climate change and other emergencies.

Such life-sustaining education ensures that the survival of crisis-impacted girls and boys is meaningful, dignified and transformative. ECW and our strategic partners are helping to keep hope alive for these children by building a new vision to ensure holistic education supports reach the world’s most vulnerable children with speed, impact and sustainability in the toughest contexts. 

It starts with empowering local action to deliver on the promise of education for all as outlined in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and Grand Bargain Agreements. We must provide teachers, aid workers and the communities they serve with the resources, tools, technology, policies and platforms they need to build safe and protective learning environments, improve the quality of foundational learning, and create sustainably funded education systems designed for the 21^st century.

Examples abound. In Gaza, ECW is funding the Norwegian Refugee Council’s Better Learning Programme, which is providing girls like Masa with temporary learning spaces and the mental health and psychosocial support they need to recover and thrive in the face of a brutal conflict.

In South Sudan, Light of the World, Save the Children, the Norwegian Refugee Council and Finn Church Aid are training frontline teachers on inclusive education to provide children with disabilities continued access to quality education.

In Bangladesh, girls like Sofaida are finally able to build life skills and learn to read and write through an ECW-funded programme delivered by the International Rescue Committee, Plan International, Save the Children, UNESCO, UNHCR, UNICEF and local partners.

Our investment in education today is an investment in an end to war, an end to uncertainty, and an end to impunity. It’s an investment in local action and local empowerment. It’s an investment in the students, teachers and communities that will lead us to a more peaceful, more prosperous future.