In an open letter delivered to ministers at a United Nations summit in Paris yesterday, a coalition of youth activists representing leading charities warn the world leaders investment in the early years is needed to avert a crisis.
The coalition – led by global education charity Theirworld – includes charitable organisations such as The Lego Foundation and the Sesame Workshop – the non-profit behind the Sesame Street TV programme. A delegation of their youth activists travelled to Paris to deliver the letter to 120 ministers attending the Transforming Education Pre-Summit, held from 28-30 June.
Within the letter, they call upon governments and international donors to guarantee a minimum of two years’ high-quality, child-centred pre-primary education for every child, as well as commit at least 10 per cent of their education budgets to pre-primary education and support early years education for children caught up in humanitarian crisis.
It states, ‘We are now just eight years away from 2030. Every subsequent year of delay raises the cost of inaction, putting the SDG 4 target - for all girls and boys to have access to quality early childhood development, care and pre-primary education - further out of reach.
‘With a firm commitment aligned to broader objectives around mobilising more resources for education, we can secure young children’s futures.’
The meeting of world leaders yesterday comes ahead of the Transforming Education Summit in September, which has been convened by the UN Secretary General in New York to discuss and find solutions to the global education crisis.
According to Theirworld, lack of investment in pre-primary education means that 175 million children around the world are missing out on early learning.
