UNICEF support for education as COVID-19 forces schools worldwide to close

Children play in the Reception and Identification Centre in Moria, on the island of Lesvos, in Greece. The situation for refugee and migrant children on the Greek islands remains dire and dangerous.NEW YORK, 20 March 2020 – Hundreds of millions of children around the world will likely face increasing threats to their safety and wellbeing – including mistreatment, gender-based violence, exploitation, social exclusion and separation from caregivers – because of actions taken to contain the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic. UNICEF is urging governments to ensure the safety and wellbeing of children amidst the intensifying socioeconomic fallout from the disease. The UN children’s agency, together with its partners at the Alliance for Child Protection in Humanitarian Action, has released a set of guidance to support authorities and organizations involved in the response. In a matter of months, COVID-19 has upended the lives of children and families across the globe. Quarantine efforts such as school closures and movement restrictions, while considered necessary, are disrupting children's routines and support systems. They are also adding new stressors on caregivers who may have to forgo work.“In many ways, the disease is now reaching children and families far beyond those it directly infects”Stigma related to COVID-19 has left some children more vulnerable to violence and psychosocial distress. At the same time, control measures that do not account for the gender-specific needs and vulnerabilities of women and girls may also increase their risk of sexual exploitation, abuse and child marriage. Recent anecdotal evidence from China, for instance, points to a significant rise in cases of domestic violence against women and girls.“In many ways, the disease is now reaching children and families far beyond those it directly infects,” said Cornelius Williams, UNICEF Chief of Child Protection. “Schools are closing. Parents are struggling to care for their children and make ends meet. The protection risks for children are mounting. This guidance provides governments and protection authorities with an outline of practical measures that can be taken to keep children safe during these uncertain times.”People wear face masks as they wait to enter a children's hospital in Phnom Penh, after the first case of novel coronavirus was reported in the country.Increased rates of abuse and exploitation of children have occurred during previous public health emergencies. School closures during the outbreak of Ebola virus disease in West Africa from 2014 to 2016, for example, contributed to spikes in child labor, neglect, sexual abuse and teenage pregnancies. In Sierra Leone, cases of teenage pregnancy more than doubled to 14,000 from before the outbreak.As part of the guidance, the Alliance is recommending that governments and protection authorities take concrete steps to ensure protection of children is integral to all COVID-19 prevention and control measures, including:Train health, education and child services staff on COVID-19 related child protection risks, including on the prevention of sexual exploitation and abuse and how to safely report concerns;Train first responders on how to manage disclosure of gender-based violence (GBV Pocket Guide), and collaborate with healthcare services to support GBV survivors;Increase information sharing on referral and other support services available for children;   Engage children, particularly adolescents, in assessing how COVID-19 affects them differently to inform programming and advocacy;Provide targeted support to interim care centres and families, including child-headed households and foster families, to emotionally support children and engage in appropriate self-care;Provide financial and material assistance to families whose income generating opportunities have been affected; and Put in place concrete measures to prevent child-family separation, and ensure support for children left alone without adequate care due to the hospitalization or death of a parent or caregiver; and,Ensure the protection of all children is given the utmost consideration in disease control measures.

A global learning crisis is undermining children’s education and their futures. Pre-COVID, more than half of children in low- and middle-income countries could not read and understand a simple text by age 10. In poor countries, this “learning poverty” rate was as high as 80 percent. Due to COVID-19, an additional 10 percent of children globally will fall into learning poverty.UNICEF Innocenti’s education research looks to address the learning crisis to ensure that every child learns. By co-creating the research with Governments, implementing partners, and communities, evidence is embedded within programmes for maximizing its use. Innocenti’s education research focuses on three areas: i) what works at school level (service delivery); ii) what works at policy level (system strengthening); and iii) how to scale up what works and address the “know-do” gaps between policies and their implementation (scaling and implementation science).  COVID-19 and EducationCOVID-19 school closures have laid bare how unprepared education systems are to deal with crises and has uncovered the uneven distribution of the technology needed for remote learning. We are investigating impacts of school closures on children and how to design and deliver effective remote learning for more resilient education systems. To deliver high quality rapid and useful research on COVID-19 and education, this research agenda is done close collaboration with the education section and Data and Analytics team in UNICEF, regional offices, and partners such as the World Bank, UNESCO and WFP. Data Must SpeakDespite the global learning crisis, even in the most difficult contexts, there are some  “positive deviant” schools that outperform others in terms of learning, gender equality, and retention. Since 2019, in line with UNICEF's Foundational Literacy and Numeracy Programme, Data Must Speak (DMS) identifies these positive deviant schools, explores which practices make them outperform others, and investigates how these could be implemented in lower performing schools in similar contexts. DMS uses a participatory, mixed-methods approach to improve uptake, replicability, and sustainability. The research is being undertaken in ten countries across two continents.Digital LearningUNICEF Innocenti’s digital learning research investigates the development, implementation, and effectiveness of digital learning across various connectivity settings (no/low/high), types of learning (blended/remote), populations, and education goals. Monitoring and implementation research is built into large scale digital learning programmes, such as Learning Passport and the UNICEF-Akelius Foundation partnership. Research is currently being carried out in: Bangladesh, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Greece, Lebanon, Mauritania, Serbia, Timor Leste. By embedding rapid mixed methods research into these programmes, this research provides timely evidence to improve digital learning solutions for all children. We not only examine what works, but also how it works in order to develop the key steps to achieve effective and inclusive digital learning. Early Childhood EducationThe first years of a child's life build the foundations for their learning and development that allow them to succeed in school and beyond. The early childhood education (ECE) research portfolio aims to use research to support the strengthening of ECE systems to ensure all children have a strong start to life. This is being achieved through implementation research into quality assurance mechanisms; benchmarking of early childhood education systems; secondary research into what works, how and in what context to improve equitable access to and learning quality in pre-primary education; as well as research on gender-transformative early childhood education systems. Learning is For Everyone (LiFE)Learning is for everyone. The inclusive education for children with disabilities research portfolio aims to ensure that education systems are inclusive of the needs of and can provide learning for children with disabilities. This will be done through applying the guidelines developed by UNICEF, GPE, UNESCO and FCDO outlined in the Education Sector Analysis (Volume III) that can facilitate the diagnosis of education systems through an inclusive lens. Additionally, the inclusive education portfolio has supported education systems by developing and trialing public-goods resources to support marginalized caregivers of children with disabilities with learning in inclusive settings.Let Us LearnLet Us Learn (LUL) uses innovation in education delivery to improve learning for vulnerable children in five countries: Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Liberia, Madagascar and Nepal. LUL programmes support children across the education lifecycle: from early childhood education; to primary and secondary school, and finally through to vocational training. Programmes are targeted to the most marginalized, such as children who are out of school or at high risk of dropping out. Mixed methods research builds evidence on how these programmes work and are effective in improving the outcomes of vulnerable children.Sport for DevelopmentSport for Development (S4D) uses sports to achieve crucial outcomes for children and youth, such as learning, health, empowerment and protection. Collaborating with partners, including the Barça Foundation, this research aims to expand the evidence base on S4D. Building on the findings of the Getting into the Game report, the second phase of this mixed-methods study includes in-depth, exploratory case studies of S4D organizations and programmes  across the globe. By harnessing the experiences of stakeholders from different countries, it identifies best practices and aims to develop a clear set of guidelines on designing, implementing, and ensuring the sustainability and scale-up of effective S4D programmes for children and youth. Time to TeachTeachers attending lessons and spending sufficient time on task is a critical prerequisite for learning in school. Yet, in sub-Saharan Africa, teacher absenteeism is as high as 45 per cent. Time to Teach identifies factors affecting teacher attendance and uses this evidence to inform the design and implementation of teacher policies in twenty African countries. Drawing from both quantitative and qualitative data on a range of topics—from motivation to retention—this research aims to identify solutions for sustainable change. Teachers for AllAfrican countries are facing the world’s worst teacher shortage. To shore up the deficit and achieve universal primary education by 2030, 6.1 million primary school teachers need to be hired in Africa alone. As COVID-19 exacerbates pressures placed on education budgets, it is crucial that the allocation of quality teachers in Africa is driven by a quest for equity, effectiveness, and efficiency, since no child should be deprived of learning opportunities because of the school they attend or their area of residence. UNICEF Innocenti is seeking to expand the evidence base on teacher allocation in Africa in order to identify how the allocation of qualified teachers can be optimized to improve equity in learning outcomes. While the equity of primary school teacher allocation is the intended focus of this research, pre-primary teacher allocation will also be analyzed. Women in Learning Leadership (WiLL)School leaders play a critical role in creating high-quality teaching and learning environments within their schools that can contribute to improving student learning outcomes. Early analysis from UNICEF Innocenti and other organizations shows that women-led schools may perform better than schools led by men. Yet, women remain largely underrepresented in school leadership roles. In some countries in sub-Saharan Africa, as few as 1 in 10 primary school leaders is a woman. The Women in Learning Leadership (WiLL) research aims to expand the evidence base on gender and school leadership and identify concrete policy and programmatic measures for increasing women’s representation. Using mixed-methods research, the project will examine the various contextual, cultural, societal, and structural barriers preventing women from advancing into school leadership roles.