Guidelines for education in situations of emergency and crisis: EFA strategic planning

This guideline presents a strategy for education in emergencies. It looks at emergencies that have already happened and at preparedness planning for emergencies that might happen in the future. It is aimed at the rehabilitation and reconstruction of education systems as well as the longer term for restoring peace, stability and sustainable development.

The paper highlights that educational response is necessary in emergencies and reconstruction for several reasons, including:

• education helps meet the psychosocial needs of children and adolescents affected by conflict or disasters that have disrupted their lives, studies and social networks
• education is a tool for protecting children in emergencies
• education provides a channel for conveying health and survival messages and for teaching new skills and values, such as peace, tolerance, conflict resolution, democracy, human rights, environmental conservation etc.
• Education for All is a tool for social cohesion, whereas educational discrepancies lead to poverty for the uneducated and fuel civil conflict
• education is vital to reconstruction of the economic basis of family, local and national life and for sustainable development and peace building.

The guidelines provide information to implement educational responses in the following areas:

• needs assessment
• strategic planning: for example in refugee camps, IDP camps, return of refugees or IDPs to their home country, for minority groups, areas of instability
• human resource development and capacity building: developing community-based approaches to needs assessment and implementation, developing mechanisms and programmes for teacher training and recognised certification in situations of crisis, displacement or reconstruction, developing emergency education expertise through professional workshops and building training capacity for emergency education among university education faculty, school inspectors and administrators, curriculum experts and teacher trainers
• curriculum policy
• addressing gender issues
• inclusive educational policies
• mechanisms for allocation of resources in crisis situations
• coordination mechanisms: between government, UN agencies, NGOs and civil society organisations; national and regional/district and community levels
• budgetary implications.