Data Becomes The Latest Defense In Protecting Education

Today we face more wars than at any other time in our existence, with 22 conflicts leading to disruption of Education and the displacement of millions. The sanctuary of Education is usually one of the first targets and the most difficult to rebuild for societies ravaged by conflict. In September 2020, the UN General Assembly unanimously passed resolution 2601, proclaiming the 9th of September as the International Day to Protect Education from Attack. This resolution reaffirms the right to Education for all children and the importance of protecting the learning environment during humanitarian emergencies. The purpose of this resolution condemns attacks against schools, along with the use of schools for military purposes – when it breaches international law. It also recognizes the need to support the provision of quality education during humanitarian emergencies and protect education provision to foster long-term development goals. As with many resolutions, the intention is to influence government policy to create a framework supporting education. The reality requires the ecosystem to be developed by various stakeholders working multi-laterally to move the dial from policy to practical interventions to protect education provision.

Data from the Global Coalition to Protect Education from Attack (GCPEA), of which the Education Above All Foundation (EAA) is a founding member, shows that globally, incidents of military use of schools and universities more than doubled in 2020 and 2021, with more than 5,000 documented attacks on Education and more than 9,000 students and educators abducted, arrested, injured, or killed. DRC, Mali, and the State of Palestine were the most affected. At the same time, Burkina Faso, Colombia, Ethiopia, Myanmar, and Nigeria also increased. Gender-directed attacks occurred in at least eleven countries. In certain countries, armed groups targeted female students and teachers or their education facilities to obstruct access to Education. Additionally, various military groups and non-state armed groups perpetrated conflict-related sexual violence against women and girls traveling to and from school or university.

Chairperson for EAA and Sustainable Development Goals Advocate, Her Highness Sheikha Moza bint Nasser reinforced the importance of protecting Education during conflict; "We must do all in our power to hold those who perpetrate attacks on Education accountable. When criminals strike schools, they strike the very heart of a community, and its culture and children's futures are destroyed."

Protecting and supporting Education requires interventions from partners across society. As charities collaborate to strengthen the type of interventions, one particularly successful partnership is EAA and Plan International. Together, this partnership has reached nearly 150,000 children through accelerated learning programs in Mali, Burkina Faso, and Niger, where over 5,500 schools were closed due to political insecurity in 2021. Stephen Omollo, CEO of Plan International, explained the challenges of disruption to Education; "Our work together in the Sahel, a region facing a worsening security crisis, shows that supporting children's Education in crisis and conflict is not 'business as usual. It requires tackling working together on several fronts to address exclusion and prevent future disruption to children's Education."

Disruption to Education creates difficult, if not impossible, recovery gaps. The data on girls' Education reinforces the likelihood of child marriages and pregnancies, reinforcing the cycle of poverty across generations. Omollo, continues by highlighting the impact on girls; "For adolescent girls, in particular, the impacts of attacks on Education can be devastating. It deepens the complex barriers they already face to going to school, such as the threat of gender-based violence. Attacks often increase and worsen existing gender discrimination and harmful practices, including early and forced marriage and unintended pregnancy. This situation could have lifelong consequences. We also know that girls living in conflict and crisis-affected contexts are nearly 90 percent more likely to be out of secondary school than girls living in a more stable environment."

Data from Plan International on gender-targeted education attacks identified that between 2015 -2019, girls and women were directly targeted in twenty-one countries. The fallout effect of the pandemic estimates that 10 million girls permanently dropped out of school, and UNICEF predicts a strong correlation with expected numbers of marriages. Disruption to Education for girls disproportionately increases the risk of child marriages leading to adolescent pregnancy and maternal mortality.

The current disruption to Education is a combination of the pandemic, climate disasters, and conflict. Omollo highlights the catastrophe impacting Education; "the world is facing a devastating global hunger crisis that needs urgent action. Forty-five million people living across 43 countries are at risk of starvation. Parents have been forced to cut back on meals for their already malnourished children. The three 'Cs' of climate change, COVID-19, and conflict have created a dire situation to which immediate and bold action is the only option."

Action to protect and prevent disruption requires deploying resources quickly and efficiently to minimize the effects of fractured education provision. The partnership between Plan International and EAA takes on a new dimension with the Track Attacks on Education Data Portal (TRACE) launch in Paris on the 9th of September, 2022. In conjunction with UNESCO, KoBo Toolbox, and through collaboration with GCPEA and QCRI, EAA created a data portal that allows for regular and frequent data updates. Historically, data was collected and disseminated every two years; however, with the portal, data is updated more frequently and allows open access to information and trends. The portal also collects data and presents a heat map demonstrating social media monitoring to help identify potential attack targets.

EAA's Program Director for Protect Education in Insecurity and Conflict (PEIC), Maleiha Malik speaking to Forbes, states, "We know data is the building block for advocacy, policies, legal arguments, and ultimately justice for the victims. The TRACE portal will give decision-makers, humanitarian and development workers, and journalists a complete picture of attacks on Education at any given time. TRACE is open to all. We encourage all who care about the protection of Education to use our data, analysis, and reports, and to work in partnership with us to ensure that we safeguard quality education for all."

The portal's evolution presents a shift in how charities and NGOs utilize the information they have to aggregate and make sense of data to determine trends. Creating an open platform supports an entrepreneurial ecosystem by promoting data-driven open-source collaboration. This approach creates even more opportunities for solutions to emerge at the grassroots and for stakeholders to react quickly to prevent further disruption to Education. By sharing and providing access to trends and data, this portal enables local stakeholders to mobilize resources and respond quickly to minimize disruption. Data is frequently described as the new oil, but knowing how to access the information, identify patterns and mobilize resources, transforms information into a valuable resource. Accurate information and speed of response are the greatest weapons in minimizing the disruption to Education. Omollo emphasized the importance of timely responses "Above all, we recognize that education cannot wait and the right to education must be protected and upheld no matter the context."