Angelina Jolie highlights plight of world’s most vulnerable pupils

The UK was pledging Dh24.5 million to help teachers in some of the poorest refugee-hosting countries.

STRICTLY NO USE BEFORE 05:00 GMT (09:00 UAE) 18 JUNE 2020

Rohingya children participate in Essence of Learning activities in one of Caritas’s child-friendly spaces in Kutupalong refugee camp in Bangladesh. ; The Humanitarian Education Accelerator (HEA) – a partnership between the UK Department for International Development (DFID), the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) – supports cutting-edge education innovations that are ready to scale in emergencies, including Caritas' Essence of Learning approach in Bangladesh's Kutupalong refugee camp. 

In 2019, Bangladesh is host to just under one million Rohingya refugees, who have fled violence and persecution in neighbouring Myanmar; 55% of that number are children (UNHCR, 2019).

The majority of Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh reside in the Kutupalong refugee camp complex in Cox’s Bazar. In this setting, where children and youth are currently unable to access formal accredited education within the national system, there is often limited access to safe spaces — where they can express themselves and access the support they need to continue their emotional and cognitive development.

In response to the huge need in this context, Caritas has opened 11 child-friendly spaces in the Kutupalong Camp — through a partnership between Caritas Luxembourg, Caritas Bangladesh and Jesuit Refugee Service (JRS).

EoL has been integrated as a key component of Caritas’s child-friendly space model — in partnership with Caritas Suisse.

EoL is an innovative, child-centred learning approach that integrates educational and psychosocial support – through structured activities, drawing and play (using recycled materials as learning aids) – to restore and enhance the learning ability of vulnerable children, particularly in conflict or crisis settings.

The EoL approach responds to evidence regarding the negative impact of toxic stress, trauma and instability o
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Actress and UN humanitarian envoy Angelina Jolie is spearheading a campaign to ensure refugee children and their teachers are not forgotten in the aftermath of the coronavirus pandemic.

She was attending virtual conference on Monday to help fund the salaries of teachers in some of the poorest refugee-hosting countries.

The UK was pledging £5.3 million (Dh24.5m) of new aid, Baroness Sugg, Britain’s special envoy for girls’ education, confirmed.

Ms Jolie, a special envoy for the UNHCR, was due to say “classrooms offer protection”, according to excerpts of her speech that were released in advance.

“For millions of children and youth, schools are a lifeline of opportunity as well as a shield. Classrooms offer protection – or at least a reprieve – from violence, exploitation and other difficult circumstances,” she said.

“Without urgent practical assistance, some of the children left without schooling worldwide due to the coronavirus may never set foot in a classroom again. We must find ways to try to ensure access to continuity of education for young people across the world.”

Ensuring that children are not affected long-term by the interruption to their education during coronavirus is a priority for the UK, the Department for International Development (DfID) said.

It added that millions of children may be left without a school to attend in the aftermath of coronavirus, potentially undermining education systems in fragile and developing countries for a generation.

“Education must be prioritised in the global recovery from coronavirus. This epidemic is not just a health crisis, it is an education crisis, especially for refugee children,” Baroness Sugg said.

“Without school and an education they will be unable to rebuild their lives and achieve their full potential.

“Supporting every child’s right to 12 years of quality education is one of the best investments the UK can make to end the cycle of displacement, poverty and conflict, as we recover from coronavirus.”

The £5.3 million of UK aid announced on Monday will allow UNHCR to make payments to 5,669 teachers in 10 refugee-hosting countries for 7 months where urgent support is needed.

The countries are Chad, Kenya, Malawi, Mauritania, Pakistan, Rwanda, South Sudan, Sudan, Uganda, Yemen.

The UK has previously announced £15m (Dh69.4m) of crisis funding from the aid budget to Unicef and £5 million (Dh23.1m) to Education Cannot Wait.

Before coronavirus, 260 million children were out of school worldwide. Now, 1.5 billion children in over 150 countries are out of school, DfID said.