A/66/269
87. The effective teaching of literacy, numeracy and life skills, such as health
preparedness and conflict resolution, is crucial to enhancing resilience during
periods of emergency. School staff must be given adequate incentives, and have
their capacity enhanced, to give appropriate attention to the psychosocial needs of
students, using resources and making schedule arrangements that allow for
recreational and expressive activities, as well as referring severely affected students
for additional support.
88. The provision of learning achievement certification is another concern related
to the quality of education in emergency contexts, in particular for students in
refugee schools. Specific strategies are required to ensure that, even in times of
crisis, students have their achievements adequately monitored, documented and
recognized.
F.
Collecting information on education in emergencies
89. Limitations in data collection in emergency situations continue to affect
humanitarian efforts as a whole. Lack of capacity to accurately assess education
needs limits the possibilities for accurately designing and evaluating education
initiatives in emergency contexts. As already mentioned, poor monitoring further
results in invisibility and consequent impunity in situations where schools are
directly targeted by violence.
90. The EFA Global Monitoring Report 2011 pointed to serious limitations in data
collection in conflict situations: “assessments of need for communities caught up in
conflict are at best haphazard, even taking into account the inevitable constraints
associated with conducting surveys in conflict affected areas”. 65 It also underlined
that donors’ assessments tend to underestimate needs in the education sector as their
proposals are often tailored to meet low expectations of donor funding. 66 Limited
attention is paid to needs assessment for qualitative aspects of education, such as
textbook supply, hours of study and in-service teacher training. Human resources
and infrastructure requirements for secondary education tend also to be completely
ignored.
91. Collecting information during emergencies requires specific strategies to
overcome the various obstacles faced in such circumstances. These obstacles may
include difficult logistics, physical insecurity, the political and ethical implications
of activities in rapidly changing environments, and the technical challenges of
working with mobile populations and populations with unusual demographic
compositions. 67
92. The Global Education Cluster developed a Joint Education Needs Assessment
Toolkit in 2010, as well as a Short Guide for Rapid Needs Assessments to provide
guidance on data collection in emergency situations. The need for further improving
monitoring capacities through the definition of a core set of indicators, including
estimated numbers of children and youth to be reached, age and gender profiles,
patterns of displacement, education materials, teacher and infrastructure
__________________
65
66
67
11-44589
Ibid., p. 216.
Ibid., p. 206.
Jennifer Schlecht and Sara Casey, “Challenges of collecting baseline data in emergency
settings”, Reproductive Health Access, Information and Services in Emergencies, 2008.
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