November’s Theme: Education

November 10th, 2009 at 3:00 am

This month, the ONE Campus Challenge is putting the spotlight on education — a powerful pathway out of poverty for children around the world. When children are able to go to school, they have a much better chance at leading productive, healthy lives and helping their families and communities escape the cycle of extreme poverty. Educated mothers, for example, are more likely to have smaller families, have their children immunized and send them to school. Education also equips people with skills to contribute to their economies and empowers them to hold their governments accountable.

Despite the far-reaching benefits of education, 75 million children remain out of school around the world. Most of these children are girls and most are living in hard-to-reach conflict zones or rural areas. In recent years, many governments have removed the biggest barrier to education by removing school fees. Thanks to efforts from African governments and savings from debt relief, 34 million more African children went to school for the first time between 1999 and 2006.

Yet other barriers still exist, such as the cost of books and uniforms, and the quality of education remains poor in many countries. Many of the children who do enroll in school do not complete a full course or do not graduate with even the most basic reading and math skills, often because their schools do not have enough teachers, books or facilities to provide a quality education.

In 2000, the world committed to ensure every child has a chance to complete primary school by 2015 through the Millennium Development Goals. While substantial progress has been made in opening school doors in the world’s poorest countries, the rate has not been fast enough. If the world is to achieve universal primary education by 2015, all children will need to be enrolled by 2010.

Recently, there has been renewed energy towards meeting these goals. During the presidential campaign, then-candidate Barack Obama pledged that during his Presidency, the United States would make a contribution of $2 billion to a Global Education Fund. And in the lead-up to the 2010 World Cup in South Africa, international football stars and FIFA have teamed up with 1Goal, a campaign to rally support for universal education.

Learn more about the 1Goal movement

Check out ONE’s issue page on education

Read ONE’s policy brief on the principles of a Global Fund for Education

Get all the latest education news and info on the ONE Blog

ONE More Challenge!

April 24th, 2009 at 10:03 am

As college students, OCCers are perhaps some of the most qualified ONE members out there to write about the importance of education — in your local communities as well as globally. Well, here’s your chance.

ONE is teaming with the Global Campaign for Education (GCE) to support The Big Read: a new storybook encouraging literacy and education for everyone. Contributions to the book come from influential figures including Her Majesty Queen Rania of Jordan as well as Nelson Mandela, Bishop Desmond Tutu, Alice Walker, Natalie Portman, Paulo Coelho and others.

Because of the important work ONE members do in advocating for global education, a ONE member will have her or his story published in The Big Read book. Click here to learn more about the contest and submit your story.

This is a fantastic opportunity for an OCC student to step up and put those classroom-honed writing skills, and OCC-honed advocacy skills, to the test. You don’t have to be a famous hero, world leader or even a leader in OCC to be in the running on this challenge. What we want is a compelling narrative telling the story of a ONE advocate. YOUR story is exactly the one we want to share with the world.

The Big Read book will be translated and distributed in over 100 countries as a tool for promoting literacy and good quality, free and public education for everyone. Children in other countries are going to learn to read using this book. And on June 16, the Day of the African Child, ONE will join GCE to present The Big Read to President Obama — with our request that he keep his promise to ensure children in developing countries have access to basic education through a U.S. contribution of $2 billion to a Global Fund for Education.

Read examples from the book and send us your story here. The deadline for submissions is May 1, 2009, and we’ll announce the winner on May 8.

Come on, OCCers — what do you say, let’s have ONE last challenge before we wrap this season.

Game On!