We, The Peoples

Education Cannot Wait follows people or populations. We reach those left furthest behind: the refugees, the internally displaced and the crisis-affected children and youth, their teachers and communities, who are all struggling to hold on to hope in refugee camps and war-torn communities. This is our added value.

A few years ago, 75 million children and youth were estimated to be left behind in emergencies and protracted crisis. Their governance structures were either unable or unwilling to deliver the basic service of an inclusive quality education, their societies torn apart by conflict and disasters, their life a constant survival amidst systematic violations of human rights, humanitarian and refugee law. Today, and as a result of COVID-19, they number 128 million. Among them are more than 79 million girls and boys under the age of 18 in forced displacement.

Education Cannot Wait invests in refugees in border camps, we invest in children and youth in conflict-affected territories no longer governed by governments, we invest in internally displaced children and youth whose whereabouts are no longer registered, and we invest in girls, adolescent girls and children with disabilities enduring marginalization. Because they are the ones falling between the cracks in national plans in countries plagued by weak governance, lack of the rule of law, conflict and forced displacement.

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Indeed, Education Cannot Wait and our UN and Civil Society partner work closely with both communities and national governments. We know that the majority of education ministries are not unwilling to deliver on Sustainable Development Goal 4. Rather, they are unable to deliver an inclusive quality education to those left furthest behind. This is where Education Cannot Wait empowers government and communities through our partners in-country.

Adopting a crisis-sensitive approach, we deliver on a development sector in contexts where the conventional development structures are unable to effectively and efficiently carry out the delivery of basic services to the whole population, including to refugees. 

‘We the Peoples’ – as the UN Charter states in its preamble – drives ECW. Our priority is to reach young school-aged people whose access to an inclusive quality education is disrupted by conflicts, climate-induced disasters and forced displacement, leaving them furthest behind in reaching Sustainable Development Goal 4.

To read the full story on Exposure WE, THE PEOPLES by Education Cannot Wait - Education Cannot Wait (exposure.co)