UNITED NATIONS GIRLS EDUCATION INITIATIVE

Leaders pledge that ‘Education for All’ will not suffer during economic crisis
OSLO, Norway, 22 December 2008 – Heads of State, Ministers, leading officials from international organizations and agencies, and representatives from civil society and the private sector gathered together at the Education for All (EFA) High-Level Group meeting in Oslo, Norway last week. Their common goal: to accelerate progress towards achieving quality education for all girls and boys by 2015.

A “sense of urgency” underscores Eighth High Level Group meeting on Education For All
OSLO, Norway, 11 February 2008 - Against the backdrop of the global financial crisis, education and development ministers, leading officials from multilateral and bilateral agencies, and representatives from civil society will meet in Oslo, Norway (16-17 December ) to recommend strategies for accelerating progress towards achieving quality Education For All by 2015.

Shaping gender attitudes in the classroom
26 November 2008 - In classrooms across the Commonwealth today, boys and girls are behaving very differently. Teachers from Malaysia and Seychelles report that girls are achieving notably higher grades in some subjects, while boys’ performance is poor. In Trinidad and Tobago, many male students are showing clear resistance to learning, which is widely perceived to be a ‘girl’ thing. In some schools, female aggression is on the rise.

Protecting girls and women from sexual violence in post-war Liberia
MONROVIA, Liberia, 14 November 2008 – Peace came to Liberia in 2003, after 14 years of brutal, devastating civil war. Since then, progress to rebuild the country has been significant: the restoration of infrastructure, public services, the economy and the rule of law is well under way.

Aichatou's story: New skills protect a former street vendor from exploitation in Niger
MARADI, Niger, 17 November 2008 – A respected tailor within her community, Aichatou has a life today that is a far cry from the one she was living just over two years ago. Back then, she worked as a street vendor in the busy town of Maradi, eastern Niger, on the border with Nigeria.

UNICEF condemns attacks on schools in Afghanistan
KABUL, Afghanistan, 14 November 2008 – UNICEF has condemned the increasing number of attacks on schools and students in Afghanistan. A recent acid attack on 15 female students walking to school in the southern city of Kandahar blinded two of the girls and injured two others.

Jordan’s Queen Rania spoofs Letterman’s Top 10 while accepting award at YouTube Live
AMMAN, Jordan, 23 November 2008 - Accepting the first ever YouTube Visionary Award via taped message, Saturday, Her Majesty Queen Rania Al Abdullah opted for a very non-traditional approach at explaining why she chose to create a channel aimed at breaking down stereotypes about the Arab and Muslim worlds on YouTube.

Her Majesty Queen Rania of Jordan visits a UNICEF-supported school project in Brazil
SÃO PAULO, Brazil, 27 October 2008 – As part of an official state visit to Brazil, UNICEF's Eminent Advocate for Children, Her Majesty Queen Rania of Jordan, visited the UNICEF-supported Aprendiz City-School, a non-governmental organization located in the Vila Madalena district of São Paulo last week.

On visit to Argentina, Queen Rania of Jordan promotes quality education
BUENOS AIRES, Argentina, 23 October 2008 – Children at a UNICEF-supported school in Argentina received a royal visitor this week, when Her Majesty Queen Rania Al-Abdullah of Jordan dropped by.

Fourth ‘All Girls to School’ campaign launches in Benin
TOVIKLIN, Benin, 22 October 2008 – “We want to go to school, achieve primary education, and go forward in order to become ministers, civil servants, teachers, physicians, top executives,” sang 12 young girls from Toviklin, a rural town in the southwest of Benin.

Camfed founder receives Women of the Year award
UNITED KINGDOM, 13 October 2008 - Camfed’s founder and Executive Director Ann Cotton has been presented with the Women of the Year Window to the World Award. The award salutes women whose courage and determination has brought much-needed attention to an international issue – in Ann’s case, the lack of educational opportunity for girls in rural Africa. The award was presented by Sarah Brown, the wife of the UK Prime Minister, at the annual Women of the Year Luncheon on October 13th.

New programme in Mauritania increases school enrolment, especially for girls
NEW YORK, USA, 1 October 2008 – Mariem Saidou Sall, 11, is in sixth grade at the Sarandougou School in the remote and poor Brakna Region of Mauritania. Like most of her friends and neighbours in the village, she rides the bus to school every morning.

UN event features $4.5 billion pledge to support ‘Education for All’
NEW YORK, USA, 26 September 2008 – Devli Kumari, now 11, came a long way from a stone quarry in India, where she grew up as a child labourer, to United Nations headquarters in New York, where she spoke at the launch of an ‘Education for All’ campaign during the General Assembly session this week.

How emergencies open the door to gender-equal education
GENEVA, Switzerland, 17 September 2008 - The right to education in an emergency and how it can be used to address inequalities in such situations are themes explored in two linked events in Geneva this week.

Improved sanitation keeps more girls in school in Malawi
DOWA, Malawi, 11 September 2008 – Eveless Mayenje purposefully walks to class, knowing that she only has two terms before she goes to secondary school. At 18, she is much older than most of her classmates in the eighth grade. This does not in any way daunt her, as she is focused on staying in school.

Goodwill Ambassador Angélique Kidjo urges girls to 'change the face of Africa'
FREETOWN, Sierra Leone, 11 September 2008 – West African singer and UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador Angélique Kidjo recently visited a UNICEF-supported girls’ education project in Sierra Leone, where she called for stronger actions to help educate girls and lift them out of poverty.

Campaign breaks the silence on child abuse in Zambia
ZAMBIA, 10 September 2008 - Camfed Zambia this year launched an ambitious child abuse prevention initiative, funded by Irish Aid. Camfed’s Zero Tolerance to Child Abuse Campaign breaks through the culture of silence surrounding child abuse, and calls on all sectors of Zambian society to put an end to it. Through this new initiative, Camfed is collaborating with the Ministry of Education to develop a National Child Protection Policy, as well as reaching out to educators, families, law enforcement officials, and politicians to establish safe and effective systems for reporting child abuse, and to ensure that perpetrators are brought to justice.

New grant unlocks education and economic opportunities in rural Africa
10 September 2008 - Camfed is delighted to announce a major new grant of $2.5 million by the Skoll Foundation. This grant is part of the Foundation’s commitment to developing ‘a global ecosystem of social entrepreneurs’.

Sara Communication Initiative helps a young widow return to school in Eritrea
HASHISHAY, Eritrea, 2 September 2008 – Amid the dry heat and the scorching sun of Hashishay village in the north-west of Eritrea, there lies an oasis of huts made of mud-brick walls and grass-and-bamboo roofs. Meriem Abubeker, a 22-year-old widow, lives in Hashishay with her four-year-old son.

Geneva workshop to address gender equity issues in emergencies
The Interagency Network for Education in Emergencies (INEE) Gender Task Team, Inter-Agency Standing Committee (IASC) Education Cluster Gender Working Group, International Rescue Committee (IRC), United Nations Girls’ Education Initiative (UNGEI) and UNICEF will co-sponsor a training workshop entitled “Addressing Gender Inequalities in and through Education in Emergencies, Post-Crisis and Contexts of Fragility”. 

Young advocates for education and gender equality meet in Nepal
KATHMANDU, Nepal, 25 August 2008 - This week youth advocates from seven countries in South Asia will come together in Kathmandu, Nepal for a second round of media and advocacy training. Many of the young advocates trained cadres of young volunteers to help promote girls’ education and gender equality back in their home countries.

Breaking gender barriers: A young woman’s quest in a male-dominated profession
BELO HORIZONTE, Brazil, 11 August 2008 – Like many children in Latin America, Paula Correa did not have an easy childhood. Her father – an alcoholic – left the family when she was seven and never came back. A few years later she lost her grandfather, her family’s main financial supporter.

UNICEF to set up 'child-friendly spaces' in the Sichuan earthquake zone
BEIJING, China, 11 August 2008 - UNICEF will work with the government of China to set up 30 centres for the long-term psychological recovery of children and families affected by the 12 May earthquake. To that end, intensive training and basic facilities are being provided to local partners and social workers.

Commonwealth study looks at classrooms and other aspects of schooling processes in 30 schools across seven countries
More work needs to be done on ‘school processes’ if the objectives of Education for All and the gender-related Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) are to become a reality, according to new Commonwealth research.

UNESCO publishes The Right to Education: Monitoring standard-setting instruments of UNESCO
4 August 2008 - UNESCO emphasizes the right to education as an internationally recognized right and its establishment in a number of standard-setting instruments adopted by the United Nations and by UNESCO.

South-East Asian countries unite to reach the unreached
BANGKOK, Thailand, 5 August 2008 - Participants from 11 South-East Asian countries (Brunei Darussalam, Cambodia, Indonesia, Lao PDR, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, Timor Leste and Viet Nam) are to come together under the theme, 'Reaching the Unreached to Achieve the EFA Goals Together'.

Access to education remains a major challenge in post-Nargis Myanmar
The Inter-Agency Network for Education in Emergencies (INEE) reports that the education sector has been severely affected, with an initial count of 4,106 schools damaged. Of the damaged, a total of 1,255 schools have been completely demolished.

Dr. Changu Mannathoko appears on "Straight Talk" Africa
WASHINGTON DC, USA, 6 August 2008 — UNICEF Senior Education Adviser Dr. Changu Mannathoko was a guest on Voice of America's "Straight Talk" Africa.

Improving Islamic schools, increasing possibilities for Nepalese girls
KAPILVASTU, Nepal, 5 August 2008 – Mr. Rakesh Srivastav, the district education officer of Kapilvastu, in the Terai region of Nepal, is on a mission. Over the next years, he wants to integrate the 200 Islamic schools in his district, known as madrasas, into the formal school system.

Women parliamentarians lead major changes in African politics
NEW YORK, USA, 22 July 2008 – Several African countries are at the forefront of a growing trend to substantially increase female representation in parliaments around the world.

Runners’ efforts keep hundreds of girls in school
LONDON, England, 15 July 2008 - A team of 16 runners braved wind and rain to take part in the British 10K London Run on Sunday, 6 July for Camfed. So far the intrepid team has raised more than £11,000 for girls in Africa, which is enough to buy 1,466 pairs of school shoes.

School readiness model gains momentum in Bangladesh
CHITTAGONG HILLS TRACTS, Bangladesh, 10 July 2008 – In a remote south-eastern corner of Bangladesh lies the Chittagong Hills Tracts, a semi-autonomous region, divided into three districts. Home to at least 13 indigenous ethnic groups and geographically and socioculturally distinct from the rest of the country, Chittagong Hills lacks such basic services as education, sanitation and health care.

Global collaboration for early childhood development
NEW YORK, New York, 10 July 2008 – Among the global early childhood community, the focus on establishing and implementing standards for learning and development is growing. These statements may be referred to as benchmarks, guidelines or standards. But they all articulate what nations hope their children will know and be able to do during their early years.  When linked to standards for teachers and programmes – and used to support teachers, monitor children’s progress or improve curricula – learning and development standards foster a fully integrated approach to early education and development.

Reviving African tales, a writer helps educate girls
ZIMBABWE, 19 June 2008 - When the writer Lisa Grainger was growing up in Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), she loved nothing better than listening to the tales told by her nanny, Ida, round the fire. Twenty years later, she gave up a full-time job as the Features Director of Elle to return to her native Zimbabwe and neighbouring countries to gather stories that have been passed down by generations of grandmas (or “gogos”).

Documentary on Zambian women honoured at Jackson Hole Film Festival
NEW YORK, USA, June 25, 2008 – ‘Where the Water Meets the Sky’, the first documentary film from the Campaign for Female Education (Camfed), was honoured with the ‘Best Global Insight’ award last week at the Jackson Hole Film Festival in Wyoming.

UNGEI meeting in Kathmandu calls for equity, gender and quality in education
KATHMANDU, Nepal, 11 June 2008 - Education experts representing United Nations agencies, donor countries, national governments and non-governmental organizations are meeting in the Nepalese capital of Kathmandu today to discuss issues related to gender equality in education in the Asia-Pacific region.

Special podcast: Women and girls tell their stories through film and radio documentaries
NEW YORK, USA, 3 June 2008 – Click here to listen to a UNICEF Radio podcast discussion on documentaries about women and girls in southern Africa.

‘Gender and Equity’ campaign shows success, as more parents are putting girls through school
ATENTOU, Togo, 20 May 2008 – According to her school principal in Atentou, 12-year-old Céline is a model student. Four years ago, along with some 60,000 Togolese children, Céline went back to school as part of the UNICEF programme ‘Gender and Equity’. She is still in school today.

Promoting girls' eduction: The experience of Nigeria
NIGERIA, 27 May 2008 - Nigeria recognizes education as a fundamental human right and is signatory to the major conventions for the protection of the rights of children (girls and boys) and women.

UNICEF, Mandela Foundation and Hamburg Society consolidate ‘Schools for Africa’
JOHANNESBURG, South Africa, 16 May 2008 – UNICEF, the Nelson Mandela Foundation and the Hamburg Society today signed a memorandum of understanding at the foundation’s headquarters in Johannesburg to consolidate their partnership promoting the six-nation ‘Schools for Africa’ campaign.

75 million children out of school, according to new UIS data
16 May 2008 - The number of primary-school-age children not in school fell by 2 million worldwide between 2005 and 2006, according to new estimates published by the UNESCO Institute for Statistics (UIS).

First Lady of Rwanda awards young women for their scholastic achievements
MUHANGA, Rwanda, 12 May 2008 – Earlier this month, 58 young women had their moment in the spotlight as Rwanda’s First Lady awarded them with prizes to celebrate their outstanding academic achievements.

3000 visit UNESCO’s online forum on inclusive education
5 May 2008 - “Inclusion and quality education are two indivisible Education for All (EFA) priorities”, writes Nicholas Burnett, UNESCO’s Assistant-Director General for Education, in his contribution to the Organization’s online discussion forum. “Inclusion means responding to the diverse needs of all learners”.

Community radio encourages girls’ education in Mozambique
MAGANJA DA COSTA DISTRICT, Mozambique, 2 May 2008 – For almost a year, many families in Mozambique have awakened at daybreak to the pleasant voice of the young announcers at Erive Community Radio, the Maganja da Costa District’s new UNICEF-supported radio station.

‘Young Champions’ support girls’ education in Afghanistan
KABUL, Afghanistan, 28 April 2008 – Faiz Mohammad Fayyaz, now in his early twenties, lost his father when he was seven years old. His mother cannot read and write, because her father did not allow her to go to school, and married her off at the age of 14. Despite all this, Faiz’s mother made sure that he and his three sisters got an education.

Digital Diarist Tsholofelo Selufaro speaks about child labor in Botswana
GABORONE, Botswana, 15 April 2008 – Around the world, 158 million children aged 5 to 14 are engaged in some form of child labour – that's one child in every six. In sub-Saharan Africa, the proportion is even higher, at one in three. However, many countries are only just becoming aware of the extent of this problem.

Africa’s Finance Ministers Look at Education as Opportunity, Not as Expenditure
Washington, April 17, 2008 – The Education for All Fast Track Initiative is a global international partnership with the objective of ensuring accelerated progress towards the Millennium Development Goal of universal primary education by 2015.

Statement by Cheryl Gregory Faye, Head of UNGEI Secretariat, on the occasion of Global Action Week 2008
NEW YORK, 22 April 2008 – This year, Global Action Week focuses on the theme 'Quality Education to End Exclusion'. This theme recognizes the need for quality education for children everywhere, in school and out. Ensuring a quality education includes identifying the social, economic and environmental needs of the child in order to provide a space for better learning and care.

UNICEF and partners lay new foundations for education with child-friendly schools in Lao PDR
BAN DONGE, Lao PDR, 8 April 2008 – The residents of Ban Donge in Xieng Khuang Province are accustomed to the foreign tourists who drop by to have a look around their village. However, the most recent group of visiting foreigners was welcomed with a grand spectacle that included local students performing Lao and Japanese dances, a gymnastics demonstration and even a recital by a famous Japanese violinist.

Mkomani, an island school connected to the world
LAMU, Kenya, 27 March 2008 – Not so long ago Mkomani Primary School in Lamu, an island off Kenya’s coast, lacked books, desks, floors and ceilings. Today 17 brand new computers acquired with UNESCO’s support adorn its premises.

Fatuma’s Digital Diary: Girls’ education in Kenya’s largest slum
KIBERA, Kenya, 4 April 2008 – Kibera is Kenya's largest slum, right in the heart of the capital city, Nairobi. The slum's million-plus inhabitants struggle with extraordinary poverty and high crime rates. As is true throughout Kenya, the vast majority of Kibera's residents are under the age of 30, and less than half of the district's youths ever begin secondary school.

Celebrating the second anniversary of Southern Sudan’s ‘Go To School’ campaign
JUBA, Southern Sudan, 3 April 2008 – As children in Southern Sudan celebrate the second anniversary of the UNICEF-supported 'Go to School' initiative, approximately 1.3 million pupils are expected to enter classes this year, as compared to some 340,000 in 2005.

First Lady of Nigeria launches the country’s Girls’ Education Initiative
ABUJA, Nigeria, 21 April, 2008 – Last month, the First Lady of Nigeria, Turai Yar'Adua, launched the Girl’s Education Initiative in the state of Bauchi, where she made a full commitment to supporting girls’ education.

Communities 'stand up to violence' as the new school year begins
KABUL, Afghanistan, 24 March 2008 – Afganistan continues to progress in the field of education, as more than six million children attended the first day of school last week – including approximately 800,000 children who are now enrolled for the first time in their lives.

Denise’s story: Small grant brings wealth of knowledge to Mozambican youth
NEW YORK, USA, 17 March 2008 – The 52nd session of the UN Commission on the Status of Women, which concluded recently in New York, could have been just another annual gathering at the United Nations where ambitious commitments are made but soon forgotten – until the next meeting, when they are made yet again.

Schools for Africa: Portrait of a role model for girls and women in Malawi
LILONGWE, Malawi, 11 March 2008 – Zile Shumba is the Executive Director of CKK Building and Civil Contractors, a company hired by UNICEF Malawi to build new classrooms as part of the Schools for Africa initiative.

Drive to boost girls’ education
CAIRO, 5 March 2008 (IRIN) - Sahar Zeidan Abdel Wareth, who helps her father on the land, could not attend school until she was 12 when a “girl-friendly” school was built near her home in Assiut Province, some 375km from Cairo.

Rehabilitation and training programmes give girls a better education in Guinea-Bissau
CASSACA, Guinea-Bissau, 3 March 2008 – Like many girls in Guinea-Bissau, Mariama Sambu, 10, has a busy life. She rises at six each morning to help with household chores, which is no easy task when you share your small home with 18 other people.

Mobilizing resources for girls' education during the Commission on the Status of Women
NEW YORK, USA, 26 February 2008 – The 52nd session of the Commission on the Status of Women is under way at the United Nations. Focusing on the priorities of financing gender equality and empowering women, the annual forum commenced yesterday with a panel of experts hosted by the United Nations Girls’ Education Initiative (UNGEI), UNICEF and the Working Group on Girls of the NGO Committee on UNICEF.

Life-skills education for girls helps end the cycle of abuse in Malawi
LILONGWE, Malawi, 22 February 2008 – At the age of 14, Catherine accidentally became pregnant, so she dropped out of school and married the father. From that moment on, the young mother’s life was filled with emotional and physical abuse. Her husband started beating her on a daily basis and sometimes would not give her any food to eat for two or three days.

Footballer Stephen Appiah promotes education with a surprise visit to his former school
ACCRA, Ghana, 13 February – Stephen Appiah, one of the biggest footballers in Ghana, made a surprise visit to his former primary school to emphasise the importance of education in this West African nation.

African Cup of Nations: Youth reporter Sandra Nyarko interviews her fellow students in Ghana
TAKORADI, Ghana, 23 January 2008 - As part of UNICEF’s campaign on Quality Education for all Children I went to my school, Chapel Hill, in Takoradi, as a youth journalist and led a discussion on the importance of education. First we organized for the kids to have some fun before we dealt with the big issues. Since the Africa Cup of Nations is being held in Sekondi-Takoradi, we played football to use the power of sport to promote education.

African Cup of Nations: Youth reporter Samuel Tronu tells a story of Ellen's struggle to stay in school
In a crowded junior secondary school classroom in a small village school sits a young woman with a story. This is a story about a girl who’s humble and hardworking.
She educates herself in everything that she does. She goes to school at Shama Junction JSS. She’s called Ellen and she is 24 years old.

Globalization Requires Education Reforms in Middle East and North Africa, Report Says
February 4, 2008—Countries in the Middle East and North Africa need to overhaul their education systems to meet the demands of an increasingly competitive world and realize the potential of their large and growing youth population.

Youth reporters promote education during the MTN Africa Cup of Nations, GHANA 2008
ACCRA, Ghana, 1 February 2008 – Edith Asamani, 17 and Stephen Iseh, 14, are two of the youth reporters based in Accra who have joined UNICEF to raise awareness of the ‘Quality Education for All Children’ campaign during the MTN Africa Cup of Nations, GHANA 2008.

Hope for Haiti’s restavecs: South-South cooperation against child labour
About 600 miles off coast Florida and only a two hour plane ride from Miami, Haiti is the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere where an estimated 300,000 children work as child labourers. Last month, the Brazilian government announced a programme to fight child labour in Haiti to be coordinated by the ILO’s International Programme on the Elimination of Child Labour (ILO-IPEC). The programme is part of a major new initiative to promote South-South cooperation in the fight against child labour worldwide.

News note: The hopes of Kenya’s children hanging in the balance
Nairobi / Geneva, 25 January 2008 - The hopes of hundreds of thousands of Kenyan children and their families hang in the balance as the two leaders in the disputed election, President Mwai Kibaki and Raila Odinga, finally begin to talk, face to face.

Following post-election conflict, thousands of children miss the first day of school
NAIROBI, Kenya, 24 January 2008 – The violence that erupted in the aftermath of last year’s disputed presidential elections has made life chaotic for many in Kenya.

UNICEF and Confederation of African Football unite to promote quality education for all
NEW YORK, USA, 16 January 2008 – UNICEF and the Confederation of African Football (CAF) have united in a joint campaign to harness the power of football during the MTN Africa Cup of Nations, GHANA 2008 – Africa’s biggest international football competition. The campaign seeks to promote quality education for all of Africa’s children.

Donor support helps WFP expand activities in Myanmar
YANGON, Myanmar,  9 January 2008 - Humanitarian food assistance activities of the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) will expand in Myanmar during 2008, building on work undertaken during 2007.

‘Beyond School Books’– an audio series on education in emergencies: Segment #5
NEW YORK, USA, 2 January 2008 – Providing education to children in regions and societies affected by conflict – or emerging from it – is a major challenge. Yet communities in conflict-affected areas consistently rank education as a high priority. And they demonstrate astounding resourcefulness and resilience in seeking out and providing schooling for their children.