education

Activist and Nobel laureate, Malala Yousafzai, remains an inspiration, but in her home country of Pakistan a small minority continue to resent her.

That’s according to her countryman Jalal Awan, a student at university in California, who came to see her speak to the UN General Assembly on Friday.

An attempted assassination on Malala when she was just 15 by the Taliban terrorist group threw her into the international spotlight.

The impact of war means that record numbers of children are being kept out of the classroom, according to the UN Special Envoy for Global Education, Gordon Brown.

Conflicts in the Middle East and beyond, have turned millions of pupils into refugees, the former British Prime Minister said, while funding has been cut year-on-year.

He was speaking just after it was announced that he will chair a new International Commission on Financing Global Education Opportunity, which has been set up by the Government of Norway.

The education and empowerment of women is essential to end terrorism and violence in strife-torn communities.

That’s according to Hanaa Edwar, Secretary-General of the Iraqi Al-Amal Association.

Ms Edwar has been attending a meeting of the UN Security Council’s Counter-Terrorism Committee.

Participants discussed integrating gender into the UN’s policies and programmes to combat terrorism and violent extremism.

Escalating conflict and political upheaval across the Middle East and North Africa are preventing 13 million children from going to school, according to a new report by the UN children’s agency, UNICEF.

The report, Education under Fire, focuses on the impact of violence on children and schools in nine countries suffering protracted conflict.

Efforts to promote sport as a tool for development received a boost after the signing of an deal to foster fresh talent at grassroots level.

The agreement, led by the United Nations Office on Sport for Development (UNOSD), targets promising future sports administrators from developing countries.

They’ll get the chance to study for a prestigious sports management master’s degree at Seoul National University, as UNOSD’s Wilfried Lemke told Daniel Johnson.

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Students and teachers in Gaza say they are counting on the UN Secretary-General to help keep their schools open and solve the current funding crisis.

The UN agency that works with Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, recently announced it would delay opening its schools in the region for the first time if it fails to raise more than US$100 million.

On Monday, UN chief Ban Ki-moon spoke via WebEx with a teacher and students whose education is threatened by the lack of funds.

Stephanie Coutrix reports.

Despite the ongoing conflict in South Sudan, children there have issued a simple and clear message: we want to stay in school.

That’s according to Save the Children which is issuing a report this Tuesday on the plight of the country’s youngsters.

A medical student from Thailand who’s studying at a university in China says the only way to understand another culture is through its language.

Siwathep Singh Khanderpor, known as “Thep,” is living proof of his mother’s belief that if you speak one language, you’re one person, but if you speak more than one language, then you’re multi-faceted.

Thep was one of the winners of a UN-backed international essay contest promoting multilingualism.