Author: kangal.naz

The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development is an ambitious, aspirational and universal agenda to wipe out poverty through sustainable development by 2030. When it adopted the new Agenda in September 2015, the international community recognized that education was essential for the success of all 17 of its goals.  Ambitions for education are essentially captured in Sustainable Development Goal 4 which aims to “ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all”.

Incheon Declaration

Through the Incheon Declaration adopted at the World Education Forum in May 2015, UNESCO, as the United Nations’ specialized agency for education, was entrusted to lead and coordinate the Education 2030 agenda with its partners. The roadmap to achieve the ten targets of the education goal is the  Education 2030 Framework for Action, adopted in November 2015, which provides guidance to governments and partners on how to turn commitments into action.

The Global Education 2030 Agenda new expanded scope:

1. reaches from early childhood learning to youth and adult education and training;
2. emphasises the acquisition of skills for work;
3. underlines the importance of citizenship education in a plural and interdependent world;
4. focuses on inclusion, equity and gender equality;
5. and aims to ensure quality learning outcomes for all, throughout their lives.

Education For All

Education 2030 goes beyond past attempts to ensure access to basic education, as set out in the Education For All goals and the education-related Millennium Development Goal 2 of 2000-2015.

The main responsibility for implementing the agenda lies with governments, with UNESCO and partners providing support through coordinated policy advice, technical assistance, capacity development and monitoring of progress at global, regional and national levels.

During an unusually sunny week in Oxford, the prestigious Said Business School hosted the 13th Skoll World Forum. Organized by Skoll Foundation, a Palo Alto-based private entity, the Forum spotlights the Foundation’s mission to explore and advance large-scale positive social change through pioneering approaches to entrepreneurship.

The Foundation maintains an educational hub, it’s Centre for Social Entrepreneurship at Oxford University, the site of its annual Forum. Founded by eBay’s first employee and president, Jeff Skoll, the Skoll initiatives help connect social entrepreneurs, funders and partners working in media, the corporate world, governments and the third sector.

Skoll’s Emerging Leaders Initiative in association with Master Card Foundation, awardees and participants at its 4-7 April 2017 Forum “Fault Lines: Creating Common Ground”, including a significant number from global south countries, tackled challenges ranging from poverty alleviation to data models. In anticipation of this high-power annual Forum, Skoll partners with other significant entities including TED, Aspen Institute, and the African Leadership.

“You only need so much for you and your family.” Jeff Skoll

The annual World Forum highlights significant contributions by renowned figures who engage in imaginative ways to channel resources to world-embracing challenges. Among others this year, Skoll recognized U2 singer, Bono, with its Skoll Global Treasure Award. In addition to ONE and Red which have helped raise millions to help those most in need, Bono has helped establish Rise, the largest social impact fund involving notable innovators turned social investors, including part-Iranian billionaire, Pierre Omidyar.

“Corruption lives in the region between declared amounts of money and the real amounts of money that are paid.” Bono (U2)

Social impact funds result in a range of success rates. The key challenge in increasing chances of success is that positive social change must be measurable. This is particularly crucial at this time of great economic shifts. After all, if financial gain and doing good can go hand in hand, then the tottering world of finance may have found the panacea it needs to survive the tsunami of economic challenges that threaten its system at an unprecedented scale.