Many girls in the flood-affected areas of Sindh have never known a true childhood; they have all had to grow up very quickly. The only way to protect their future will be to make good quality care and education available to them.
Last Thursday International Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) Day. That might sound like a far too technical term to merit a celebration, but in fact it’s central to everything we (and by we NGOs and governments) do to mitigate the impact of emergencies on children’s lives.
Recently, I had the opportunity to work with the Somalia education team and learned about an amazing teacher, she is one that deserves a spotlight on World Teacher’s Day.
There may be different interpretations of what ‘life-saving’ covers, but I use Sarah’s quote above to justify that we have to be thinking about what will save children’s lives in the longer teerm, after an emergency is over.
Education has a vital role to play in the creation of the world’s newest nation.
Save the Children’s No Child Born to Die campaign is trying to raise awareness and tackle the toll of preventable child deaths. We believe that the improvement of health systems and increased vaccination coverage are vitally important measures for decreasing child mortality. However education, particularly maternal education, is also hugely important.
At the preschool, I meet five-year-old Elton. His three-year-old sister, Reddy, wanders nearby, seeming curious. Elton’s eyes gleam when asked about school – he says he loves it. His teacher, Geeta, says that he’s been a regular and keen student in his one year here. She has 17 children in her class, nine boys and eight girls, aged four to five.
