4. Action at the International level

The Dakar Framework emphasizes that while progress towards EFA must be measured by gains at the national level, such progress will inevitably require partnerships. Specifically, it declares, 'Partner members of the international community undertake to work in a consistent, co-ordinated and coherent manner', with each partner contributing 'according to its comparative advantage in support of the National EFA Plans'.

Education is increasingly gaining importance in the strategies directing the work of important international bodies such as the G8, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and the World Bank, as exemplified in the attention paid to EFA in the World Bank/IMF Autumn 2001 Meeting. An important recent initiative is the establishment of a Task Force of senior G8 officials to advise the G8 on how best to pursue the Dakar goals.

Inter-agency flagships
Flagship Programmes have emerged that address some of the broad objectives laid out in the Dakar Framework. These programmes bring resources (knowledge and experience) to countries as they implement their EFA plans. They are mechanisms for sharing what works for developing quality education outcomes. To date the flagship partnerships developed include girls' education, Focusing Resources on Effective School Health (FRESH), Aids/HIV, Schools and Education, Literacy and Adult Education, education in situations of emergency and crisis, and early childhood care and education and education and disability. An interagency partnership on quality has also emerged as a forerunner to a new group on Teachers and quality.

Six of the Flagship Programmes are well established and functioning. Two others are still in the planning stages, and active consideration is being given to the establishment of two more - which would bring the total to ten.

Operational flagship programmes

1. The 10-year United Nations girls' education initiative (UNGEI)
Launched by the United Nations Secretary General at the World Education Forum, UNGEI is a coherent United Nations system-wide collaborative programme aimed at improving the quality and level of girls' education and eliminating gender bias and discrimination in education.

The programme is co-ordinated by UNICEF, but it is open to all agencies and organizations, including bilateral donors and NGOs working in the area of girls' education. The programme operates at both the country and global levels, and it seeks to join bottom-up and top-down efforts while understanding that leadership must come from the national partners. A major thrust is to work with governments to assure that gender-related components are included in national EFA plans. It appears that, until now, most activities on girls' education had been carried out by individual agencies.

Although UNGEI was launched only a year and a half ago, a surprising number of collaborative and ongoing activities have taken place at the field level. Forty-four countries have thus far addressed girls' education in their Common Country Assessments, and twenty-two in their United Nations Development Assistance Frameworks.

A number of country teams have carried out joint reviews of the status of girls' education. In Pakistan, for example, the country team supported the government in developing a strategy to increase the net primary school enrolment for girls. In Viet Nam, UNICEF and the World Bank have analyzed national census data with regard to the status of girls' education, then held follow-up discussions with the Ministry of Education and Training.

Other UNGEI-related activities have included inter-agency collaboration on advocacy programmes in Bangladesh, a seminar in Egypt and a series of national round tables in Kazakhstan. All of the United Nations agencies in Yemen are engaged in programmes of support, including a large-scale operation aimed at expanding girls enrolment. WFP is working with the Ministry of Education, Youth and Sport in Cambodia on a programme that supplies hot breakfasts to poor pupils in rural elementary schools. On the regional level, ARABEFA has launched an initiative on Universities and Civil Society in girls' non-formal education.

2. Focusing resources on effective school health (FRESH)
This programme, also launched in Dakar in 2000, grew out of increasing number of studies documenting the fact that health and education are inseparable, as well as out of the increasingly urgent need to combat AIDS and drug abuse among young people. Led by UNESCO, UNICEF, WHO and the World Bank, in collaboration with Education International and several other agencies, the FRESH partnership signals the commitment of these agencies to assist national governments in implementing school-based health programmes.

The FRESH framework is based on the premise that there is a core of cost-effective activities which, implemented together, provide a sound basis and point of departure for intensified and joint action to make schools healthier for children and thereby enhance the ability of children to learn and the prospects for achieving the goals of EFA. Specifically, the programme is working to assure that every pupil will attend a school that offers a healthy, safe and secure school environment, including provision of safe water and sanitation. It also seeks to assure that all pupils will have access to health and nutrition services as well as to skills-based health education, including health promotion and the prevention of important health problems.

As with the girls' initiative, FRESH has already led to a wide variety of ideas. Partners have facilitated the introduction and financial support for implementation of FRESH initiatives in fourteen African countries, including capacity building for school health and HIV/AIDS prevention through schools in sub-Saharan Africa. Regional technical meetings and workshops have taken place in East Asia and the Pacific, and a Health Promoting Schools network is active in the Central and Eastern Europe Region. Still other activities include drug education in schools in Viet Nam, in-service teacher training on school health issues in Saudi Arabia and water and sanitation programmes in Burkina Faso, Colombia, Nicaragua, Nepal and Zambia.

The principal FRESH partners recently met in Paris with numerous health organizations, including the United States Centers for Disease Control, to begin development of a multi-risk factor surveillance system for young people. The FRESH initiative was endorsed in a Declaration adopted by education and health representatives of the UNESCO E-9 initiative and the WHO Mega Country Health Promotion Network during the XVII World Conference on Health Promotion and Health Education in Paris in July 2001.

The declaration commits the partners to work towards the achievement of the goals of EFA, notably through fostering the integration of efficient school health programmes into National EFA Action Plans and supporting their implementation. It also calls for the implementation in all countries of the core components of FRESH in all schools, supported by effective partnerships between the education and health sectors at all levels, and with the full participation of communities, parents, children and youth.

On the regional level, ARABEFA is launching a FRESH project in co-ordination with the Health Education Resource Unit at the American University in Beirut. Phase one will cover six Arab countries.

3. Inter-Agency Working Group on HIV/AIDS, Schools and Education
In less than two decades, HIV/AIDS has become a development disaster. Infection rates in Africa have reached alarming proportions, but they are also growing rapidly in Asia, the Caribbean and Eastern Europe. Protecting a new generation from HIV/AIDS is integral to success of the movement for EFA and to the future of education systems, which are themselves falling victim to the effects of the pandemic. It is critical that the education sector be seen, and see itself, as a central player in this global priority.

At the initiative of UNAIDS, an inter-agency working group has been established that brings together United Nations agencies, bilateral donors, international NGOs, international teachers' unions and education associations. Its task is to develop a global strategy framework designed to help governments and agencies develop plans for HIV/AIDS prevention and impact as part of an expanded global response. The overall goal is to bring together the globally agreed aims of ICPD+5 with those of EFA. ICPD+ focuses on a 25% reduction in HIV infection rates among young people in the most affected countries by 2005 and globally by 2010 - the achievement of which will directly affect our ability to achieve EFA. Specific objectives of this strategy are: decreasing risk, reducing vulnerability and managing impact together to form an 'expanded response'.

In keeping with a strategy meant to enhance existing national and international frameworks, IIEP on behalf of UNESCO, has established a unit dedicated to gathering and synthesizing research and experience related to the impact of HIV/AIDS both on education systems and on individuals within them.

The thrust of the strategy is based on the assumption that preventive education will work better if implemented within an education system which is itself working well. In addition, attention must be given to the impact of HIV/AIDS, whether actual or as projections. As such preventive education needs to be placed in the context of attention to care and support for people living with or affected by HIV/AIDS. Action has to be taken at the highest political level, but also at grass roots to gain the confidence and participation of communities.

4. Literacy and adult education
Considerable evolution has occurred within United Nations agencies in recent years in thinking about literacy. Whereas illiteracy was once thought of as a social pathology, it is now viewed as a structural phenomenon and a social responsibility. Likewise, whereas literacy used to be viewed as a panacea for social development, it is now seen in the context of broader educational and socio-economic interventions. The task is no longer to 'eradicate' illiteracy but rather to create literate environments and societies.

Recognition has also grown that literacy education takes place both in and out of the school system, that it centres around learning rather than teaching, and that it must be understood as a lifelong learning process. Teachers now understand that there is no single or universal method or approach to literacy. Rather, the promotion of literacy must extend across the entire school curriculum and make use not only of conventional tools like pencils and papers, but also of keyboard and digital technologies. Finally, planners have come to understand that the promotion of literacy is the responsibility not only of the state and the formal school system, but also of civil society.

A literacy and adult education flagship has been adopted within EFA. Prior to the Dakar Forum, the United Nations General Assembly proposed to declare a Literacy Decade, and this initiative will be implemented in the light of the Dakar goal on literacy. Thus the Decade and the Flagship programme are expected to coincide as a single thrust towards the 2015 target of achieving a 50% improvement in levels of adult literacy. UNESCO is facilitating the preparation of the United Nations Decade through initial planning in order to work towards a strong inter-agency partnership.

This flagship has undertaken a number of activities on the policy level, including development by UNESCO in Latin America of a Regional Framework for Action for Youth and Adult Education. Several national workshops and forums have been organized in Africa and Asia/Pacific in support of Dakar sections on literacy and non-formal education.

Planning-level activities have ranged from the preparation of guidelines to improve non-formal education in India to diversification of organizational structures for literacy programmes in the Arab region. Implementation activities have ranged from the setting up of large-scale community learning centres to providing literacy teachers with materials. Many of these activities have been undertaken in co-operation with governments and/or NGOs. A good example has been the establishment in Pakistan of Literacy and Continuing Education Centres and libraries for rural women by Sindh Education Foundation. The flagship has also sponsored new research on literacy by organizing meetings of experts and conducting surveys on adult literacy and non-formal basic education. Advocacy activities have included the production of publications on the relevance of literacy and non-formal basic education in specific national contexts.

Current EFA monitoring systems are mainly relevant to formal education, which constitutes only one facet of EFA. Given the importance of monitoring, it is important that methodologies for monitoring and evaluating literacy and non-formal education and providing statistical information be developed and promoted. Such systems will represent an important tool for improving educational planning, decision-making, co-ordination between NFE providers, management, delivery mechanisms, quality, and accountability in this area. The important complementary and supplementary role played by NFE programmes in attaining EFA goals is often underestimated. The need for NFE information systems must be addressed so as to build a sound knowledge base of this sub-sector. It is crucial that all stakeholders be involved in this undertaking and that government, NGO and civil society providers work together in building up the NFE information base which is required.

5. Education in situations of emergency and crisis
Emergencies caused by armed conflict, chronic crises or natural disasters are a major constraint to the achievement of EFA. Children and adolescents in refugee, internal displacement or other crisis situations have the right to receive an education and to benefit from the stabilizing and reassuring environment that schools provide. The importance of these rights was recognized by the Dakar Framework, which cited the need to 'meet the needs of education systems affected by conflict, natural calamities and instability'. Thus, Education in Situations of Emergency and Crisis was named a Flagship Programme.

Education is increasingly viewed as the 'fourth pillar' of humanitarian response alongside those of food, shelter and health. Reasons for education in emergency include the psychosocial needs of children and adolescents affected by trauma and displacement as well as the need to protect them from harm and to maintain and develop study skills. Key messages, relevant to new and stressful situations, are disseminated, such as HIV/AIDS prevention, landmine and environmental awareness, and peace and citizenship education. Although education is required in emergency situations and its benefits are overwhelmingly positive for children, there are donors who do not see education as part of a humanitarian intervention.
In the 1990s, as many as 1% of the world's population was displaced by conflict or other disasters. In many displaced populations, children under 18 make up half of the population. UNHCR (2000) statistics identify that out of 6.9 million refugees, 2.3 million are of school age.

However, only 800,000 children and young people - 40% of them females - are recorded as beneficiaries of education services provided either in refugee camps or in specially situated programmes. Refugee camps are organized to provide for social services, including schools. Camps cited as providing model education programmes are those in Nepal for Bhutanese refugees, in Pakistan for Afghanis, and in Guinea and Uganda for multiple refugee populations. Much of this work is implemented by both international and local NGOs, many in partnership with United Nations agencies and bilaterals.

Primary schools are seen as a priority, and resources for secondary, vocational and adult basic education, and special programmes are fewer. The educational needs of older children, out-of-school youth, children with special needs (child soldiers, disabled) and women are often neglected. These needs are recognized in refugee camps, even if they are not adequately addressed. However, for internally displaced populations such as those currently in Afghanistan, educational needs are rarely either recognized or addressed. Education for All entails providing quality education for refugees and those who are internally displaced.

Following the Dakar Framework for Action, situations of emergency must be taken into account as legitimate contexts for providing quality education. In countries of continuing crisis, such as Somalia, Angola and Sierra Leone, efforts are being made to support education, even though their situations are not stable. The educational needs of these and many more countries should be explicitly addressed within formal mechanisms such as national plans and CAPs and given increased support by donors.

In order to give more recognition to the issue of crisis education, the World Education Forum authorized the formation of the Inter-Agency Network for Education in Emergencies
(INEE) to work towards 'practical strategies and mechanisms to achieve more effective inter-agency collaboration at global, regional and country level'. INEE is the inter-agency vehicle for the Flagship Programme. The Network is under the leadership of UNESCO, UNHCR, UNICEF, CARE and the Norwegian Refugee Council, and it has a staffed Secretariat within UNESCO's Unit for Support to Countries in Crisis and Reconstruction.

INEE has produced a checklist of key points to be considered in developing national EFA plans. These points relate to countries' ability to assess education needs for refugee and internally displaced children. Other concerns are co-ordination and preparedness in case of disaster, including budgetary implications, as well as strategic options, such as safe storage of education records, registers and curricula. Another priority is the building of the capacity of Ministry of Education administrators and teachers to work effectively in emergency situations. INEE encourages all countries to develop a disaster preparedness plan that includes education.
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To provide assistance to agencies involved in crisis-affected countries, INEE is working to develop sharable, generic learning materials, as well as policy guidelines and standards in col-laborationwith SPHERE. Four specialized international task teams have also been established to develop teaching and learning resources, monitoring and evaluation instruments, guidance notes for formal and non-formal post-primary edu-cation, and tools for information sharing. INEE has a growing membership roster of agencies, including Ministries of Education and bi- and multi-lateral donors.

6. Early childhood care and education
The Consultative Group on Early Childhood Care and Development has been an active participant in the EFA process at the international, regional and national levels over the past decade and has frequently voiced serious concerns about insufficient attention in regions and countries to the Dakar goal of promoting enhanced early childhood care and education.
Other concerns have focused on the lack of broad-based part-nerships and the lack of funds committed to this purpose on the ground by governments.

Numerous programmes are operating under this flagship. Forexample, with assistance from Bernard van Leer Foundation and UNICEF, five national level case studies - in Colombia, Jamaica, Nepal, Namibia and the Philippines - were carried out with the aim of developing ECCD indicators for their specific contexts. Critical lessons learned were the value of the process

The need for teachers Unless large numbers of new teachers are hired over the coming decade, numerous countries may fail to achieve universal basic education by 2015. The global teacher shortage is most acute in Southern Asia and much of Africa, but countries in all regions rich and poor alike - are reporting a shortfall. For example, the United States will have to recruit an estimated two million new teachers during this same period. To do this, comprehensive and sustainable solutions that give central importance to the training, recruitment, deployment and retention of motivated, well-paid and well-resourced professional teachers will need to be found - it will not be enough to add places in traditional teacher training institutions. Distance learning for teachers will play an important role in this process, which may involve low-cost, low-tech methods, for instance the use of radio. But this may prove to be daunting task. In many countries, the teaching profession holds little allure for po-tential recruits because of low pay, poor working conditions, exposure to violence and decline of prestige. The nearly 59 million teachers worldwide represent the single largest group of highly skilled and educated pro-fessionals in the world. In Indonesia, teachers make up half of the entire tertiary-educated work force. In Jordan, 99% of primary school teachers have received a tertiary education. Teacher salaries in developing countries typically take up two-thirds or more of education budgets, and in some case go up to 90%. Another menace to the profession is the HIV/AIDS pandemic, which threatens to wipe out much of the progress made in boosting literacy and general education levels. In some African countries, more teachers are dying of AIDS than are entering the school system. In Zambia, for example, more than 100 teachers died per month on an average in 1998. In Zimbabwe, a study of commercial farms showed that 48% of primary-school-age AIDS orphans and all secondary-school-age AIDS orphans had dropped out of the school system.

for those involved, the importance of defining early childhood indicators locally, and the need to ensure valid measurement instruments. As a result of these five case studies, there has
been a growing interest expressed by other countries and by Consultative Group networks and partner organizations in early childhood care and education.

Consultative Group members are also concerned with the real absence of attention and information on what is happening to children under the age of five and to their various caregivers. There is also virtually total neglect of the broader and longer-term
issue of the care and nurturing of the youngest children in families and communities impacted by HIV/AIDS. The Consultative Group is now working on a new initiative to develop approaches and efforts for the under-fives. Another concern is that there is too much emphasis on education defined as schooling and not enough on the wider learning opportunities present in homes and communities. The Consultative Group also recognizes that this can result in over- looking of other needs, such as children impacted by migra-tion,
conflict and violence.

New flagship programmes

1. Teachers and quality of education
UNESCO is currently considering the establishment of a flag-ship programme that focuses upon teachers, specifically upon the improvement of teacher education, with the aim of
enabling large numbers of teachers to provide quality basic education for all (see box, above).

The teaching flagship under consideration would address two sets of issues. The first would involve the substantive chal-lenges of recruiting, educating, appraising and paying teaching
professionals,and then providing, as far as possible, a quality teaching/learning environment in which to operate. The second set would revolve around the challenge of ensuring that 34
teachers and their organizations are fully involved in edu-cational decision-making at all levels of a system, including the formulation and implementation of EFA national plans.

Specifically, the proposed flagship initiative envisages a pro-gramme to strengthen quality teacher education in Africa in collaboration with ILO, UNICEF, Education International and
other partners. Among other things, this programme would include an 18-month effort to evaluate selected Écoles nor-males supérieures in French-speaking Africa, as well as the development of minimal sub-regional standards for quali-fications for entry into the teaching profession in sub-regions where such common standards are desired but currently
lacking.

Another objective would be to establish a sub-regional inter-ministerial inter-sectoral process for enriching the quality of teacher education reform. This project would be piloted in a sub-region in which several ministries of education or higher education are engaged in fundamental reform of their teacher-education programmes to help meet Dakar goals. This project would involve UNICEF, the ILO and Education International together with UNESCO.

2. Education and Disability
The flagship on education for all and the disability dimension within the framework of inclusive education recognizes that children, youth, and adults with disabilities have a basic human right to quality public education. The flagship alsoacknowledges growing donor interest and commitment to placing disability issues squarely on the broader development agenda.

The flagship will bring the diversity of global, regional, and national organizations that comprise the disability community into the EFA dialogue. WHO estimates that this community numbers 600 million people with intellectual, sensory, devel-opmental and/or mobility disabilities.

The flagship on EFA and the disability dimension will also be key to advancing 'inclusive education' as a primary approach to achieving EFA goals. Disability is a crosscutting issue. Therefore, the flagship will contribute to the important work of the other flagship programmes by making them more inclusive, particu-larly those focusing on early childhood care and development, school health, HIV/AIDS, teacher training, adult learning, and reaching girls and other excluded groups.

Finally, the flagship will help to identify and expand quality programmes.Many EFA partners are currently implementing a wide range of programmes to advance quality education for people with disabilities. The flagship will accelerate a more sys-tematic adoption and expansion of these programmes among all EFA partners, and will also help to identify a wide range of resources that will be needed to achieve EFA goals for children, youth, and adults with disabilities.

On the regional level, UNESCO Beirut and Save the Children Fund Sweden have jointly launched a project on Inclusive Education of Children with Special Needs in Formal Education. The project will examine progress in the development of an inclusive system of education that responds to the diversity of learners and minimizes exclusion, so as to chart the progress made by learners with impairments in overcoming barriers of access to and participation in education.

Proposed flagship programmes

Two additional flagships are in the early planning stages. The first will focus on the use of information and communicationtechnologies in promoting EFA, particulary ICT-based distance education for teacher education and training. The second willfocus on issues of governance.