? 20-22 October 2020 ? 13:00 to 15:00 PM (CEST – Paris)
Virtual
UNESCO, in partnership with the Governments of Ghana, Norway, and the United Kingdom, are convening a virtual Global Education Meeting. The meeting aims to secure commitments from leaders for the protection of education financing during the COVID-19 recovery, and produce consensus on priority actions for the next year.
The COVID-19 pandemic has created the most severe disruption to global education systems in history, forcing more than 1.6 billion learners out of school at the height of the crisis. It has exacerbated pre-existing inequalities and impacted vulnerable learners the hardest. The pandemic threatens to reverse decades of progress in education. The economic downturn will put increasing pressure on national education budgets and aid to education at a time when higher funding is required for the sector to recover. According to projections, even if the budget share allocated to education remains stable, overall public spending could drop by 8% and aid to education could fall by 12%
The 2020 GEM will provide a unique platform for exchange among high-level political leaders, policymakers, and global education actors to protect and rethink education in the current and post-COVID-19 world and agree on global priority actions for educational recovery and progress in the Decade of Action for Sustainable Development.
The event is a strategic opportunity for Member States and the international community to maintain and boost their commitment to education as the most critical investment for a sustainable recovery and future.
A set of global priority actions for the recovery and strengthening of education systems will focus around the following five themes considered central to the COVID-19 response:
- Protect domestic and international financing of education
- Reopen schools safely
- Focus on inclusion, equity, and gender equality
- Reimagine teaching approaches and learning outcomes
- Harness equitable connectivity and technologies for learning
Original source: UNESCO
