A Quarter of a Million Refugees Reached by JRS Global Education Initiative

The Jesuit Refugee Service (JRS) is happy to announce that the Global Education Initiative (GEI) has surpassed its goal of providing education to 250,000 refugees by 2020, two years before the end of the campaign. To achieve this goal, JRS had also pledged to raise USD 35 million by 2020 to maintain our quality education and livelihood training programmes. We are well on our way to realising this financial goal, having raised 81 per cent of the funds at the end of 2018, and will continue the campaign to raise the remaining USD 6.7 million to ensure we can keep providing education to the people we serve.

With some 13 million people in protracted refugee situations (spending five years or more as a displaced person), and half of all refugees being children,  JRS felt compelled to launch the GEI campaign in 2015 in response to the challenge posed to us by Pope Francis that year: “To give a child a seat at school is the finest gift you can give.” The success of the campaign will enable JRS to give refugee children a safe and stable learning environment, and provide older refugees with the tools to access the economic opportunities that they need to build a future for themselves and their families.

When a population moves to a place, due to emergency situations and particularly after conflict, education is key to restoring and promoting well-being, as well as restoring the community. Nadezhna Castellano, Former JRS International Education Specialist

The Global Education Initiative takes steps to ensure sustainable, lifelong opportunities for education. The initiative is committed to being:

Accessible. It is available to all who are displaced, for as long as they are displaced.

Varied. It runs pre-primary, primary, secondary, post-secondary and supplemental education programs for children, adults, and prospective teachers.

Adaptive. It is trauma-informed and draws from the local and refugee communities.

Equal. It is committed to increasing access for women and girls, especially in secondary education.

Sustainable. It trains teachers from within refugee communities.

Expansive. There are opportunities for post-secondary and professional education for adult refugees.

More information on the Global Education Initiative can be found in our 2018 Annual Report.

 

Source: Article republished from JRS news