Civil society advocates from all regions called upon governments to give systematic priority to ensuring that the most vulnerable and marginalized groups have access to quality education and to respect financing benchmarks, during the 9th global meeting of the Collective Consultation of NGOs (CCNGO) for Education 2030 that gathered in Hammamet, Tunisia, on 3 and 4 December 2019.
Wrapping up eight panel sessions on all aspects of inclusion and equity, members recommended specific political attention to the following areas:
- Strengthen evidence-based policy dialogue to raise awareness and influence government policy through dedicated mechanisms;
- Ensure that legal, policy and planning frameworks adopt an inclusive rights-based approach;
- Guarantee education and psycho-social support for refugee, displaced and migrant children and ensure that teachers are trained to be sensitive to their cultural identities;
- Support teachers with training to promote a culture of inclusion and to help students open their minds through critical pedagogies. Adequate salaries, decent working conditions and more autonomy are essential to support and value the profession;
- Allocate dedicated budgets to adult learning, the least supported part of the lifelong learning;
- Invest in disaggregated data to capture the full reality of exclusion and to hold governments accountable;
- Encourage citizen monitoring of public budgets on education to ensure resources are directed to support equity and inclusion.
