Access, quality and wellbeing: experiences and learning from Concern's education programmes

Welcome to the latest edition of Knowledge Matters, which looks at Concern’s work in Education across both Development and Emergency contexts. The education programme has a technical focus on improving the lives of extremely poor children by increasing access to high quality primary education and supporting child wellbeing. Concern believes that all three outcomes are important to address if we want to make a positive impact in the lives of the children where we work.

There has been a shift in the countries that Concern provides education support to over the past two years. In line with the Global Education Policy and Strategy, there has been an increased focus on Education in Emergencies with the expansion of traditionally development focused programmes in countries such as Niger, Sierra Leone and Somalia to include Education in Emergency responses, and a substantial expansion in recent years of the programme in Lebanon and Turkey. Currently, Concern provides education support in 12 countries.

The issue starts with a brief summary of the main outcomes from the education meta-evaluation conducted this year and then goes on to share learning emerging from our various programmes in Turkey, Lebanon, Syria, Somalia, Sierra Leone and Niger. Each of the articles presents a unique approach to how access, quality and wellbeing are being addressed in education programmes within the various contexts and shares some of the lessons learned and promising practices emerging.

In Somalia, Concern is helping communities affected by displacement find stable and sustainable solutions to accessing quality education. Niger outlines their work around bilingual literacy interventions. The Home Learning Techniques curriculum in Lebanon builds the capacity of parents to support their children at home in their learning and development. In Turkey, Concern provides Syrian children with opportunities that help them integrate into the formal education system. Turkey, Lebanon and Syria have all incorporated psychosocial support in their programmes. Finally, the Safe Learning Model (SLM) being implemented in Sierra Leone, seeks to prevent and respond to school-related gender based violence (SRGBV) and gender inequality issues that negatively affect children’s learning.