International Save the Children Alliance
Global Campaign for Education
Global Action Week: The World's biggest lesson
On April 23rd 2008, more than 7.5 million children, adults, teachers, campaigners and politicians in over 100 countries took part in the Global Campaign for Education's "World's Biggest Lesson" to learn about the importance of everyone having the chance to receive a quality education.
Today, there are 72 million children excluded from school, over half of these out of school children, 37 million, live in conflict affected fragile states. Save the Children is a member of the Global Campaign for Education, founded in 1999, to bring together Civil Society organizations, NGOs, teacher unions and child rights activists working on quality education for all. In many countries Save the Children has actively participated in the "World's Biggest Lesson" with Rewrite the Future a key campaign in the push for basic education for all children.
In Japan, 28,415 children from 243 schools joined the World's Biggest Lesson organised by the Japan NGO network for Education (JNNE) which includes Save the Children. Save the Children gave a lesson to 27 students of 3rd grade of a junior high school. Among the participants, were Mr. Koichi Yamauchi, member of the House of Representatives and 4 members of the Fast Track Initiative, a global compact that encompasses all major donors for education to help low-income countries achieve a free, universal basic education by 2015. They came from UK, Ireland, and Spain and joined the discussion with students.
In Romania, more than 51,000 participants of different ages participated to the World's Biggest Lesson in more than 300 schools in rural and urban areas. The event was organised by Save the Children. The President Traian Basescu joined Save the Children in one of these lessons. The World's Biggest Lesson brought together children and teachers, representatives of the Ministry of Education, Research and Youth, of the School Inspectorate of Bucharest and of the International Labour Organisation, who collaborated with Save the Children partners in organising this event.
In Germany, Save the Children held the World's Biggest Lesson outside the German Reichstag. Officials were presented with their school report card marking Germany's performance on providing support to Education for All.
In the UK, Save the Children invited young people from Sierra Leone, Pakistan and Cote d'Ivoire to speak to Members of Parliament in the House of Commons. Speaking from their own experiences, the young campaigners talked about the difficulties for children and young people in accessing a quality education in their countries (more information here).