Children and COVID-19 Research Library

The world is in the depths of a learning crisis, made worse by the COVID-19 pandemic. This report finds that COVID-19-related school closures and other disruptions have sharply increased learning poverty, a measure of children unable to read and understand a simple text by age 10. The report, The State of Global Learning Poverty: 2022 Update, a joint publication of the World Bank, UNICEF, FCDO, USAID, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and in partnership with UNESCO, stresses that even before the pandemic, there was already a learning crisis. Since then, COVID-19 has sharply increased learning poverty, with COVID-driven school disruptions exacerbating the severe pre-pandemic learning crisis.

The COVID-19 pandemic illuminated the vulnerabilities of our education systems, worsening existing inequalities and digital divides even as it highlighted the essential value of accessible, inclusive and quality education. Learning communities, expected to make rapid, sweeping changes, were caught unprepared, causing learning losses that will reverberate for years to come. This was particularly true for many countries in Africa, where further infrastructural development, training, domestic resources and funding were – and are – needed to mitigate the effects of pandemic-related education disruptions that exacerbated the pre-COVID-19 learning crisis. Unprecedented change has followed, involving new collaborations and innovations that engaged the regional community at every level, from policy-makers to school leaders, teachers and learners, through original examples of ingenuity and transformation.

The analyses made and findings presented in this paper are based on the data collected through  a rapid assessment carried out in July/August 2021 by UNESCO staff  (Section of Education Policy, Education Sector)  from various sources including information available online (articles, papers, blogs, websites of countries’ Ministries of Education), media reports, national and international organizations’ databases and reports (e.g. the UNESCO-UNICEF-World Bank-OECD Survey of National Education Responses to COVID-19 (2021) and the UK ENIC Special ReportonCOVID-19 -Guide to International Secondary Assessment in 2020.

This first UNESCO Policy Report on Inclusive and Resilient Societies, released as the world enters the third year of the pandemic, analyses the causes, nature and evolution of inequalities during the COVID-19 crisis. High-level analysis and findings are detailed in this summary, with detail provided in the report.

In March 2020, after the coronavirus cases in Bangladesh were confirmed, both Humanitarian Play Labs (HPL) and mainstream Play Labs temporarily stopped their face-to-face operations according to the government mandate. The pandemic endangered people’s physical health and highly impacted their socio-economic and mental health conditions. Hence, BRAC explored alternative approaches and designed a telecommunication model, Pashe Achhi, to support all the direct beneficiaries during the pandemic. The objective of the intervention was to be connected with the beneficiaries and promote children’s wellbeing and development through play-based learning, positive parenting, and self-care practices of caregivers. Since caregivers are the core agent for children’s learning and development during the pandemic, the model provides psychosocial support and learning support to them. To facilitate the calls, the model trained facilitators on ECD, learning through play, playfulness, and mental health. Pashe Achhi is a telecommunication model consisting of tele-counseling and tele-learning components. After receiving the training, the Play Leaders started to call the families every week to conduct a 20 minutes phone session (10 minutes with the mother and 10 minutes with the child) based on the scripts delivered. In the first 10 minutes, Play Leaders give mothers and caregivers basic psychosocial support, tips on engaging with children and discuss health and hygiene issues.

Digital citizenship is understood as an urgent educational priority in an information age. Organizations working across the sector have argued for the need for greater digital literacy and digital citizenship education of children and young people so they can harness the educational, civic and economic opportunities of an increasingly connected world, while also learning skills to protect themselves from online risks and harms. This report presents findings from the ‘Mapping and review of online resources for, and perceived needs among vulnerable and marginalized young people in the Asia-Pacific region on digital literacy, safety and participation’ commissioned by UNESCO and UNDP. This rapid assessment aims to understand the needs of LGBTI young people and Young Key Populations (YKP) in the AIDS response in the Asia-Pacific region, in their quest for more secure digital spaces and improved experiences of digital citizenship. The assessment will also act as key guidance material for Youth-led organizations (Youth Lead and Y-Peer) to develop their own tools and resources for their communities and support grassroot level organizations to build online platforms for advocacy.

Several factors are contributing to the ongoing evolution of Education Management Information Systems (EMIS). These include increasing digitization of education sector management and education delivery, the accompanying generation of large volumes of data, including about the learning process itself,and the availability of technologies for their analysis (big data analytics), as well as real-time. The pandemic-induced shift to distance learning and the post-pandemic new normal of hybrid learning modalities accelerated the influence of these factors on EMIS systems. In light of thesechanges, it is important to re-formulate the expectation that a modern EMIS should not only serve as a tool for national statistical reporting but rather as a tool to support digitized administrative management at all levels through the provision of timely and actionable information services, and that, furthermore, it should not only support administrative management but also directly  support learning management, including within hybrid and blended learning modalities. This paper, and the discussions during the second International EMIS Conference, stressed that to implement a modern EMIS, it will be important for policy makers to create the necessary (i) legal, policy and institutional frameworks, specifying key EMIS and data governance processes and providing sustained funding commitments to support a multi-year process, (ii) invest in upgrading and sustaining the technological infrastructure, and to (iii) heavily invest in human capacity building.The paper also explores the potential contributions that frontier technologies such as Artificial Intelligence and Blockchain can make to future EMISs and discusses the role of a community of practice as well as guiding principles for the further evolution of EMISs.

 

This publication investigates the evidence on the gendered impacts of extended school closures and periods out of school. The aim is to ensure that responses to the current and future crises are informed by an understanding of how they affect education access, participation and outcomes, as well as children’s nutrition, health, well-being and protection. Building on the findings of 154 studies from every region of the world, it highlights how extended school closures and periods out of school deepen gendered exclusions and vulnerabilities – with the poorest children being the most affected. Seven different forms of gendered impact on education processes are delineated, linked to failures to address the needs, rights and capabilities of girls, boys, women and men, and to build institutional structures to sustain equality and protect from violence.

The COVID-19 pandemic has caused unprec-edented    disruption    to    social,    economic,    and cultural life worldwide. In Kenya, when schools  and  universities  closed  in  March 2020,  nearly  18  million  Kenyan  learners were  affected,  putting  at  stake  not  only  the  considerable  economic,  social,  and  political  gains  experienced  by  the  country  over  the  past decade, but also the significant commit-ment the Government has made to providing inclusive, quality education. This  analysis  aims  to  provide  policy  recom-mendations  to  strengthen  the  leadership  of  ministries of education (MoEs) and collabo-ration  with  partners  to  continue  to  provide  quality education in crisis situations. It seeks to shed light on this central question: What facilitates  government  leadership  in  crisis  and  risk  management  in  education  and  how  can  humanitarian  and  development  actors  more  effectively  support  the  Ministry  of Education in Kenya to lead effective educa-tion service delivery during crises?

Two years into the COVID-19 global pandemic, education has been seriously disrupted. In response to this crisis, the global priority remains to ensure every child is supported so they can return to school and catch up on lost learning. Recognizing the need to accelerate education recovery with urgent, at-scale action, this joint report by UNICEF in partnership with UNESCO and the World Bank highlights staggering levels of learning loss globally and takes stock of the measures being taken by countries to mitigate learning losses as schools reopen. Based on a survey of 122 UNICEF country and fundraising offices administered in early March 2022, the report presents the importance of and progress made in five key actions for education recovery, the RAPID: Reach every child and retain them in school; Assess learning levels; Prioritize teaching the fundamentals; Increase catch-up learning and progress beyond what was lost; and Develop psychosocial health and well-being so every child is ready to learn.

Based  on  an  analysis  of  35  countries,  this  brief  report  aims  to  provide  a  current  overview of  national health  and  safety  protocols  to  keep  schools  open,  their  dimensions  and  how  they  are  designed, implemented  and  regulated  to  ensure  the  continuation  of  education.  It  also  aims  to  guide  education systems by outlining some lessons learnt and effective practices on how the reopening of schools might be achieved safely and successfully. Finally, the report seeks to contribute to a better understanding of the  impacts  of  the  protocols  on  learning  as  well  as  the  social  and  emotional  well-being,  health  and development of learners and teachers.In a changing environment where infection rates are increasing at an exponential rate, it also explores how the Omicron variant is affecting current operations and what education systems should do to keep schools open while ensuring that all students are safe and learning.

School closures to mitigate the spread of COVID-19 have caused unprecedented disruption for nearly 1.6 billion learners across the globe. Beyond alarming effects on learning loss and school dropout, they pose an immediate and long-term threat to gender equality, with gender-specific effects on health, well-being and protection. This publication exposes these impacts and calls for effective strategies to ensure education continuity, promote gender equality and improve lives and futures. Through a review of published research, a global survey of actions taken by organizations in favour of gender equality in education, and in-depth data collection in five countries, UNESCO and its partners underline the challenges faced by children and young people to continue learning, and to return to school safely. When schools shut also showcases the efforts made by governments and the international community to mitigate harm and safeguard progress towards gender equality in and through education.

The global disruption to education caused by the COVD-19 pandemic is without parallel and the effects on learning are severe. The crisis brought education systems across the world to a halt, with school closures affecting more than 1.6 billion learners. While nearly every country in the world offered remote learning opportunities for students, the quality and reach of such initiatives varied greatly and were at best partial substitutes for in-person learning. Now, 21 months later, schools remain closed for millions of children and youth, and millions more are at risk of never returning to education. Evidence of the detrimental impacts of school closures on children’s learning offer a harrowing reality: learning losses are substantial, with the most marginalized children and youth often disproportionately affected. The State of the Global Education Crisis: A Path to Recovery charts a path out of the global education crisis and towards building more effective, equitable and resilient education systems.

Since the beginning of the pandemic, efforts have been made to monitor both school closures (and re-opening) and the measures put in place to ensure continuity of learning. These include the Survey of Ministries of Education on National Responses to COVID-19, jointly supported by UNESCO, UNICEF and the World Bank. However, to date, no systematic evidence has been available on how students’ learning is being affected by the disruptions caused by the pandemic or on the impact of education response measures initiated by governments. This report contributes to filling this evidence gap and includes a series of simulations of potential learning losses due to COVID-19 and exploration of their longer-term implications. The analysis is based on the Enabling learning for all framework, which outlines access, engagement and enabling environment as the three crucial enablers for learning, while the simulation assumptions are informed by the evidence on school closures and governments’ education-related responses, collected through the joint survey.

As the pandemic amplified inequalities in education, the need to leverage the potential of rapid technological change and digital connectivity in support of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) became evident. Technology can introduce agile ways of delivering education services, but to leave no one behind and efficiently use resources, it is critical to engage partners as success can only be achieved when governments, the private sector, civil society and other stakeholders work towards a common goal. The Global Education Coalition (GEC), with 200 partners operating in 112 countries, is deploying cross-country missions and conducting large-scale data collection and advocacy. The Coalition is a community committed to responding to the COVID-19 crisis, building resilience, and reimagining education to leave no one behind, in line with SDG 4.