In the shade of a mango tree many kilometers away from the nearest electricity line sits Emmanuel Lomoro on his laptop, where an almost robotic voice is heard: “Emmanuel, can you hear me? My wifi connection is disturbing me today.” Emmanuel knows the feeling of talking online and only getting back words like “I am sorry, could you repeat that” or “You are breaking up”, but today he is on a call with his mentor in Germany and having the better connection of the two, despite being in one of the least expected places for broadband internet. He sits in the middle of one of the world’s largest ref ..read more

Photo by Charanjeet Dhiman on Unsplash In October 2019, the Global Business Coalition for Education and UNICEF South Asia organized the South Asia Youth Skills and Solution Forum. Almost two years later a lot has happened in the world, and as is the case for many other countries, young people in India have been deeply impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic. We recently asked Anita Rajan, the CEO of Tata Strive – one of the leading organizations providing learning opportunities to disadvantaged children in India – to tell us more about the skills and learning gap in India, the work ..read more

New York/ Dubai: December 9 2021: The Global Business Coalition for Education, the leading organization for corporate responsibility in education, announced that dozens of companies have committed to support education by signing the Education Business Pledge ahead of the RewirEd Summit in Dubai. The announcement comes as more than half of all young people are not on track to have the most basic skills for employment by 2030 and the pandemic continues to exacerbate these trends with millions of the world’s students still affected by partial or full school closures. As the digital divide increas ..read more

Photo Credit: @robowunderkind During Digital Inclusion Week, Justin van Fleet, GBC-Education Executive Director, joined a panel discussion organized by HP on accelerating digital equity in education, healthcare and economic opportunities.    The event was co-hosted with the National Digital Inclusion Alliance (NDIA) and moderated by Morgan DeBaun, founder and CEO at Blavity, alongside Autumn Glover of Ohio Health and Angela Siefer of the National Digital Inclusion Alliance. The discussion focused on how each organization can help build local ecosystems to support digital equity with ..read more

Photo by Tina Floersch on Unsplash The LEGO Foundation shares the mission of inspiring and developing the builders of tomorrow with the LEGO Group. As part of the LEGO family, it was established in 1986 and has become a central player in promoting early childhood education and learning through play for all children, everywhere. The LEGO Foundation aim to build a future where learning through play empowers all children to become creative, engaged, lifelong learners. Through 25% ownership of the LEGO Group, the LEGO Foundation has helped fund programs that ensure children acro ..read more

As we start a new year and think about how businesses can do even better to support public education, let’s take a look at the insight and knowledge shared by our partners in 2021. Last year, leaders from large and small companies such as Deloitte, HarozTec, the LEGO Foundation, and Tata Strive took the time to share their insights with us and provide advice on why and how other businesses should support education. Here are some of their answers: Why should a business invest in education? With Anita Rajan, CEO of Tata Strive In India over 90% of our working age group of the population is in th ..read more

Tom Whitehill, Head of International Development Projects and Siobhan Lynch, Group Strategy Manager for Avanti Communications talk about iMlango, the company’s flagship program to provide broadband connectivity to primary and secondary schools in East Africa. Seven years after it was introduced it has now reached over 180 000 youth in more than 240 schools. In this video, Tom and Siobhan also shares some lessons learned. Tom Whitehill (TW): Hello. My name’s Tom Whitehill and I’m Head of the International Development Projects here at Avanti Communications. Siobhan Lynch (SL): And I’m Siobhan ..read more

https://skillsfriendlycities.org Dell Technologies, Deloitte Support GBC-Education’s efforts for The Big Ideas, Bright Cities Initiative to Help US City Leaders Build Skills for Young People New York / November 15, 2021: The Global Business Coalition for Education (GBC-Education) today announced the launch of the Big Ideas, Bright Cities Challenge to drive innovation and creativity in skills building for young people. The challenge will award cash grants and in-kind business support to winners with the most powerful ideas to make their com ..read more

Photo credit: Lana Wong This week, the former President of Tanzania took over as leader of the Global Partnership for Education (GPE), which has helped millions of the world’s most vulnerable and marginalized children into school. GPE works with more than 70 partner countries to transform their education systems and has helped 160 million children, more than half of them girls, go to school. Jakaya Kikwete was President of Tanzania from 2010 to 2015. He became a special envoy for the influential Education Commission and has been an ardent supporter of the Global Business Coalition for Educ ..read more

By Jamira Burley, head of youth engagement and skills at GBC-Education Photo: @ActionVance As the Covid-19 pandemic has increased society’s inequalities, it has also accelerated the transition to the fourth industrial revolution while raising concerns about the widening gap between individuals and communities. Although many have called for the creation of a Universal Basic Income, the conversation on the global implications of the opportunities and threats associated with this era of technical advancement—which will place hundreds of millions of young people around the world at risk – has y ..read more