Network News Blog
Posted: 10/02/10
Dale Buscher is Director of Protection at the Women’s Refugee Commission.
Even before the earthquake struck, some 800,000 persons in Haiti were living with disabilities, including 200,000 children. An estimated 194,000-250,000 people were injured in the earthquake, many of whom will suffer long-term disabilities. Handicap International estimates that there are at least 2,000 new amputees.
People with disabilities are often overlooked, neglected and forgotten in disaster relief and humanitarian response. Yet they are among the most vulnerable of the affected, particularly if they have lost their traditional caregivers-extended families and neighbors. The organization I work for, the Women’s Refugee Commission, has identified problems faced by displaced people living with disabilities in settings around the world-and proposed solutions. We have outlined some key activities to help the people of Haiti who have sustained disabling injuries.
Humanitarian agencies and others working in Haiti must take these people’s needs, concerns and abilities into account when designing and implementing programs and activities in order to promote access, inclusion and the full participation of persons with disabilities. This is true whether providing shelter, food, water and sanitation, health services, education or livelihoods.
Since people with disabilities are often kept hidden out of sight or are unable to reach registration centers, special efforts must be made to locate and register them to ensure they receive the services they need.
Dozens of makeshift camps have sprung up around Port-au-Prince. As the crisis continues, it is likely that more long-term camps will be established. The shelters in these camps—as well as latrines, water points and bathing areas—must be accessible to all, and people with disabilities, including women, should be involved in decisions about where they are located. As planning for reconstruction gets underway, people with disabilities should be included, to make sure that permanent shelters, schools, health centers and other public buildings are accessible to everyone.
We saw disturbing pictures of near-riots as desperate people have fought to get food and water at distribution points. In such situations, the likelihood of people with disabilities getting anything is remote. They should be prioritized in food and water distributions, and arrangements should be made to deliver rations to those who are immobile.
Access to health care, including reproductive health services, is critical. Doctors and other health care staff, both those working with humanitarian agencies and Haitians, need to be trained on disability issues, and specialized treatment and assistive devices must be provided. There will be a great need for prostheses, and experts to fit them.
Many of the newly disabled are children and young people. Temporary and reconstructed schools must be made accessible to them, and it is important that children with disabilities be mainstreamed into regular schools and classrooms whenever possible. Children with specific learning needs should receive special educational services. This will mean providing appropriate training and support to teachers to equip them with the skills to address the learning needs of children with disabilities.
Besides having special needs, people with disabilities have great potential. Taking advantage of their skills, experiences and expertise, they should be tapped as program staff, project resource persons and program participants. They should also be included in skills training, income generation and employment projects, including cash- and food-for-work projects.
Those living with disabilities were underserved in Haiti prior to the earthquake and were often shunned and stigmatized. The emergency response and reconstruction efforts provide an opportunity to amend past neglect and discrimination and assist persons with disabilities to live richer, more dignified lives. Designing interventions that take into account the specific needs and abilities of people with disabilities can have an enormous effect on improving their well-being and their protection.
Click to download the Women’s Refugee Commission’s Persons With Disabilities and the Humanitarian Response in Haiti: Key Messages and Guidance for Action in English, French and Creole.
Click here to download the INEE Pocket Guide to Inclusive Education.
This post was originally published in The Huffington Post.
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Posted: 05/02/10
The GMR Team invites INEE members to participate in the on-line consultation (on-going through February 28) to develop content and research priorities for the 2011 Education for All Global Monitoring Report on Education and Violent Conflict.
Click here to learn more and get involved!
To receive updates such as this directly to your inbox visit www.ineesite.org/join.
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Posted: 05/02/10
Today we sent a message to INEE members with news of the winners of the 2009 Jackie Kirk Commemorative Competition.
Click here to read the entire message.
Click here go to the announcement webpage here.
To join INEE and receive news and resources directly to your inbox click here.
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Posted: 03/02/10
Today on the INEE listserv, we launched a brief survey requesting users of the INEE Minimum Standards Toolkit to let us know what you think. In 2010 we will updating the Toolkit, and we would like to make sure it is as relevant and user-friendly as possible, so please help us out:
Complete this five minute survey!
To join INEE and receive news and resources directly to your inbox click here.
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Posted: 25/01/10
Ban Ki-moon, Secretary-General of the United Nations, and Irina Bokova, Director-General of UNESCO, launched Reaching the Marginalized, the 2010 Education for All Global Monitoring Report at UN headquarters in New York on 19 January 2010. This was followed on 20 January by a policy event in Washington, DC at the Brookings Institution.
Click here to read the INEE listserv message about the launch, including the Report’s findings on conflict, natural disasters and marginalisation.
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Posted: 21/01/10
Today we sent a message to INEE members with the latest information about the crisis in Haiti, and updates on the coordination of education response.
As the response to the acute emergency in Haiti continues, and educational services are reestablished, INEE morns the losses to our community, and emphasizes the role our sector, and INEE as a network can play as Haitians work to rebuild. Sharing tools and information and connecting education practitioners working directly on the relief effort with those that have experience from other emergencies is a service we encourage all INEE members to engage with and contribute to. Please comment below, link to tools or ask for more information.
Click here to read the entire message.
To join INEE and receive news and resources directly to your inbox click here.
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Posted: 11/01/10
Click here to view today’s listserv message to learn more about the call for applications and the criteria to join the INEE Steering Group.
To join INEE and receive all future moderated listserv messages please visit www.ineesite.org/join.
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Posted: 18/12/09
Shogufa Alpar is an Administrative Assistant at the Polytechnic Institute of New York University and formerly worked for the Women’s Refugee Commission as a Program Coordinator. She lived in Pakistan as a refugee for over fifteen years while fleeing the war in Afghanistan. She is an active INEE member.
I have just read the BBC’s piece Casualties of War about the challenges faced by Pakistanis internally displaced in Karachi due to the fighting between the government and the Taliban in South Waziristan. It is disheartening to learn that a country in turmoil because of the insecurities brought on by terrorists refuses to accept displaced students into their public schools:
…discrimination is even taking on an institutional form. Public schools and colleges in Karachi are now refusing to admit students living in the city, unless their fathers were also residents. “I want to continue my education as soon as the new session begins,” says Yawar, Wilayat Khan’s son.
The challenges refugees face are insurmountable – leaving their home, belongings and community. Every day they are forced to make difficult choices, and as citizens of the world we need to make sure that their basic rights (water, food, shelter, education) shouldn’t be one of them.
It is the short-sightedness of the government to respond to terrorism just militarily. A country’s security and prosperity is in the hands of its government and citizens. In order to have a secure and prosperous country, there needs to be a civil society that can hold the government accountable for its actions or lack of it. For an engaged civil society there needs to be an engaged and active citizenry and for an engaged and active citizenry, there needs to be quality education for all.
It may sound unattainable to have quality education for all but we have to aspire and work towards it. There are so many resources that can help us take the steps toward quality education for all here on the INEE website. We need to hold the donor community responsible for taking a long-term approach towards fragile states: pushing them to implement innovative programming. Governments, UN and International and local non-governmental organizations need well-trained and qualified staff to effectively and successfully execute the existing international polices in the field. And above all, accountability by all parties towards the communities they are serving.
For the latest information about education and the crisis on Pakistan, please see the ReliefWeb pages here: http://www.reliefweb.int/rw/rwb.nsf/doc116?OpenForm&rc=3&cc=pak&secid=3
Are there any INEE members working in Pakistan that are aware of this problem? What advocacy has been undertaken to ensure the displaced learners have access to education, either in Pakistan, or other in other contexts?
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Posted: 17/12/09
Click here to read today’s listserv message on the Safe Schools and Hospitals Pledging Initiative and learn how you can get involved!
To join INEE and receive future listserv messages visit ineesite.org/join.
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Posted: 10/12/09
Today, Thursday 10th December is World Human Rights Day, with a theme of non-discrimination. As practitioners, policymakers and researchers we must use World Human Rights Day as an opportunity to consider how we can ensure that our work is non-discriminatory and actively inclusive of all those affected by crisis. Click here to read INEE’s Listserv message marking this day, and see a selection of relevant tools, resources and websites to support us in our work towards fully inclusive education in emergencies.
To join INEE and receive news and resources directly to your inbox click here.
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Posted: 08/12/09
Peter Hyll-Larsen is coordinator of the Right to Education Project, housed with ActionAid International and in partnership with Amnesty International and the Global Campaign for Education. Peter is also focal point for human rights in the current INEE Minimum Standards Update process.
Human rights in emergencies are the same as human rights at all times and in all situations; they do not disappear, cannot be diluted, or put on hold. This is especially so for non-discrimination. It is true to argue that education is primarily a social and economic right, and it is therefore subject to progressive realization. This argument is in line with international treaties, and is perhaps especially relevant in emergencies, when the State and other duty-bearers have so much else on their hands – or when they may have disappeared altogether from scene.
No problem: apart from schools themselves acting as community centers, offering protection and shelter, it must be accepted that the provision of education is one or two steps after securing food and shelter …. but never more than that: two steps, and it is back to school and the attempt to re-create stability, continuity and mitigate the prospect of lost childhoods!
Once in school (in IDP camps, in temporary buildings, whatever), the most fundamental human right of any learner is the right to non-discrimination. This is especially so in emergencies, when many more groups will find themselves vulnerable and marginalised, when there is a fight for scarce resources and access, when groups already discriminated against will be pushed even further to the margins of society, and when discrimination itself may have been the cause or the fuel of the conflict.
Securing the right to education for such groups at particular risk of discrimination and exclusion is one of the fundamental challenges in emergencies. It is so for States, because it is in the treatment of these groups of society that we see the real test of a government’s duty to protect, respect and fulfill the right to education of its citizens and those under its jurisdiction.
The challenge is equally great for activists, civil society and the humanitarian agencies acting on behalf of the International Community, since it is in the active involvement, and in the consideration and respect for these groups throughout the planning, designing and implementation of education that we enhance opportunities for participation and accountability, recognizing everyone’s equal rights but different abilities.
Non-discrimination is the theme of Human Rights Day 2009, celebrated this week on the 10th December. We at the Right to Education Project join in the celebration by conducting an online Forum all week on the topic of discrimination in education. We hope very much that you have the time to surf past and contribute to the conversation: as INEE members you’ll bring the crucial perspective of discrimination in emergencies and the challenges emergencies pose to human rights. Visit the Forum here.
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Posted: 08/12/09
Attacks on learners, educators and education institutions are tragically common in many parts of the world today. From girls being attacked on their way home from school in Pakistan, to the disappearance and assassination of teachers and trade union workers in Colombia, to the occupation and destruction of educational buildings in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, these acts are abhorrent, violating fundamental rights and undermining the provision of education and the life-saving and life-sustaining supports that learning can provide, particularly in the midst of crises.
Reducing the incidence of attacks on education and bringing perpetrators to justice is critical to the safety and development of individuals and communities affected by conflict and insecurity. An international seminar convened by UNESCO from 28 September to 1 October this year brought together a range of actors, including education, protection and legal experts, to take critical stock of existing research and practice, identify opportunities to strengthen monitoring and reporting, increase accountability and encourage rigourous research to address these issues.
The recommendations from this event and a collation of new resources on this topic were shared on the INEE Listserv. To access the entire message click here.
To join INEE and receive news and resources directly to your inbox click here.
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Posted: 20/11/09
Today is the 20th anniversary of the Convention of the Rights of the Child (CRC), which is a legally binding international instrument spelling out the principles that Member States of the United Nations agree to be universal - for all children, in all countries and cultures, at all times and without exception, simply through the fact of their being born into the human family. The four core principles of the Convention are non-discrimination; the best interests of the child; the right to life, survival and development; and respect for the views of the child.
The CRC is of particular importance to education in emergencies, because it forcefully brings together provisions relevant to emergencies and armed conflict in ways that few other international treaties do, offering added protection for the consistently most vulnerable group: the child.
To read INEE’s Listserv message marking this anniversary, and see a selection of relevant tools, resources and website, you can view the INEE listserv messsage here.
To join INEE and receive news and resources directly to your inbox click here.
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Posted: 21/10/09
Read about progress made in the last year in today’s listserv message, and learn about new opportunities around Sphere-INEE trainings and revision processes.
Click here to download and share the 1-year Anniversary flyer within your organizations and partners, to help raise awareness about the need for holistic humanitarian action that recognizes the critical linkages between education and the other sectors.
To receive updates on the field of education in emergencies in your inbox, please click here to join INEE.
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Posted: 20/10/09
INEE is developing a user-friendly tool on financing modalities for country-level actors working on financing of education. Click here to learn more in this recent listserv message.
To join INEE and receive moderated listserv messages please click here.
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Posted: 24/09/09
INEE’s Blog was officially launched today, and you’ve found it! Download the announcement listserv message here.
To join INEE and receive news and resources directly to your inbox click here.
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Posted: 22/09/09
Visit the Sphere Companionship webpage here
The concurrent update of the Inter-Agency Network for Education in Emergencies’ Handbook of Minimum Standards for Education in Emergencies, Chronic Crises and Early Reconstruction (2004 edition) and the revision of the Sphere Project’s Handbook - Humanitarian Charter and Minimum Standards in Disaster Response (2004 edition) are now underway. In line with the Sphere/INEE Companionship Agreement, we are seeking to ensure as many linkages as possible between the update and revision processes. Specific activities include mutual representation in the respective revision structures and processes, with the objective of mainstreaming education and references to the INEE Minimum Standards throughout the Sphere Handbook and strengthening inter-sectoral linkages and references to the Sphere Handbook in the INEE Minimum Standards Handbook. In addition, reference will also be made in both publications to the companion relationship and complementarity between the Sphere and INEE standards.
If you would like to provide specific suggestions on how to best mainstream education in the next edition of the Sphere Handbook and strengthen the linkages between the two sets of standards, you may:
- Conduct a local/regional or community level consultation meeting. Guidance on running consultations is available here. Feedback should be provided at the latest by 30 November 2009.
- Provide feedback to Allison Anderson (INEE), email: .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) and Avishan Chanani (Sphere), email: .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
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Posted: 21/09/09
Today is the International Day of Peace! To see a selection of relevant news, tools and resources, read the INEE listserv messsage here.
To join the INEE listserv and receive news and resources directly to your inbox click here.
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Posted: 07/09/09
Tomorrow is International Literacy Day! To see a selection of news, tools and resources, read the INEE listserv messsage here.
To join the INEE listserv and receive news and resources directly to your inbox click here.
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Posted: 31/08/09
INEE announced the composition of the new INEE Working Group on Minimum Standards (2009-
2011) in today’s listserv message.
To view the new members and the working group’s objectives, and to read the entire listserv message, click here.
To join the INEE listserv and receive news and resources directly to your inbox click here.
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Posted: 25/08/09
Today on the INEE Listserv, the INEE Working Group on Education and Fragility shared an Update on the Situational Analyses of Education and Fragility - Afghanistan Desk Study, Liberia Field Study.
To read the entire listserv message, click here.
To join the INEE listserv and receive news and resources directly to your inbox click here.
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Posted: 21/08/09
Today on the INEE Listserv, the INEE Working Group on Education and Fragility announced the release of an issue paper entitled Capacity Development for Education Systems in Fragile Contexts. To read the entire listserv message, click here.
To join the INEE listserv and receive news and resources directly to your inbox click here.
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Posted: 13/08/09
Marking the first anniversary of Dr. Kirk’s tragic death, INEE is launching a Commemorative Competition, seeking to identify academic papers and practitioner-authored case studies that document innovative gender-responsive research, policy or practice in the field of education in emergencies. Download the Call for Papers and Case Studies here.
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Posted: 17/07/09
In July 2009, INEE Issued a listserv message titled “Moving Forward the Sphere and INEE Companionship: Call for Case Studies on Intersectoral Approaches to Education.” As part of the operationalization of the Sphere-INEE Companionship agreement, this initiative aims to build an evidence base which all members can use to inform policy, advocacy, tools, training and best practices.
To read and participate in the call, click here.
To read more about the Sphere-INEE Companionship agreement, click here.
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Posted: 17/07/09
This call, made in July 2009, aims at creating a central location for interested professors, instructors, students, and others who are developing curriculum and course outlines in the field of Education in Emergencies.
To view submitted course syllabi, click here.
To read the ‘Call for Course Syllabi’, click here
To submit a syllabus, mail .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
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Posted: 26/04/09
You can view photos taken during the INEE Global Consultation 2009 here.
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Posted: 26/03/09
As INEE members from all over the world begin their journeys to Istanbul, we are happy to launch the INEE Global Consultation Blog, where you will find coverage of the activities in Istanbul as they unfold. We will be posting summaries of the day’s events, interviews, photos, videos, and guest blogs written by delegates.
You can join the discussion - comment on posts, or if you are interested in writing a piece for inclusion on the blog, please email .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).
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Posted: 17/03/09
INEE’s Task Team on Inclusive Education and Disability is pleased to announce the publication of Education in Emergencies: Including Everyone - INEE Pocket Guide to Inclusive Education in Emergencies. Click here to learn more, and order your copy!
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Posted: 26/11/08
As you can see, INEE has redesigned its website. We hope that this new website will serve the INEE membership better, and will enable us to work more efficiently as a community. We are excited about many of the new features you will find, and we encourage you to explore the site. Please bear with us as we work to implement the remaining upgrades and update content and pages. If you have any comments of questions, please email .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).
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Posted: 26/11/08
INEE and the Sphere Project are pleased to announce a companionship agreement whereby Sphere acknowledges the quality of the INEE Minimum Standards for Education in Emergencies, Chronic Crises and Early Reconstruction and of the broad consultative process that led to their development. Read More Here.
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Posted: 26/11/08
You can now dowload the full event programme, including details of plenary and workshop sessions and participant list. Click here for more information.
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