CHILDREN

Globally, more than 700 million women alive today married before the age of 18. Each year, 15 million additional girls are married as children, the vast majority of them in developing countries. Child marriage is widely considered a violation of human rights, and it is also a major impediment to gender equality. It profoundly affects the opportunities not only of child brides, but also of their children. And, as a study we issued this week concludes, it has significant economic implications as well.

When Laila was 15 years old, she had to leave school to help support her family by selling small goods on the streets of Marrakech. It was grueling work and she lived in fear of violence or assault.

While education has for years been at the forefront of the global development and social agendas, its place on the diplomatic agenda has arguably been less prominent.  As such, ’Education Diplomacy’ is an idea whose time has come.

Global Money Week (GMW) is an annual global celebration, initiated by Child & Youth Finance International (CYFI), with local and regional events and activities aimed at inspiring children and youth to learn about money, saving, creating livelihoods, gaining employment and becoming an entrepreneur.

Bilal, along with hundreds of Syrian youth, volunteers with UNICEF’s education campaign promoting ‘Curriculum B’ – a new learning programme specifically designed for students who have missed out on education due to violence or displacement.  This innovative fast-tracked learning programme combines each two educational levels in one year, cutting the required years of education in half and allowing children to catch up with their peers.

Scaling what works—taking effective solutions to social problems to a scale that truly transforms society—has become a powerful catchphrase in the nonprofit world, and for good reason: It is our best chance for far-reaching change in international development and the social impact sector more broadly. A lot has been written about the big questions surrounding scale: What does it mean to create transformative scale? How do we do it, and when? Which programs are worth scaling in the first place?