UNICEF and Confederation of African Football unite to promote quality education for all children
21 January 2008, Cairo: UNICEF and the Confederation of African Football (CAF) have united in a joint campaign to harness the power of football during the 2008 Africa Cup of Nations- Africa’s biggest international football competition. The campaign seeks to promote quality education for all of Africa’s children and will be featured during the tournament in Ghana on billboards and in televised coverage of matches. Famous football players from various African countries taking part in the tournament – including Stephen Appiah from Ghana and Samuel Eto’o from Cameroon have joined the campaign through appearing in a series of public service announcements, helping to disseminate across Africa the message that quality education helps children, especially girls, to stay in school and gain the knowledge and confidence that they need to pursue their dreams. “Since Egypt has witnessed substantive advancement in enrolment, the focus of the UNICEF/Government of Egypt partnership has increasingly moved towards improving educational quality, increasing school retention and completion rates, reducing the gender and geographical disparity, improving school environment and children's developmental readiness to start primary school on time, especially marginalized children.“ said Dr. Erma Manoncourt, Representative of UNICEF Egypt. The Government of Egypt’s commitment to education is strong, and most recently the Ministry of Education has developed a national strategic plan which addresses several issues such as improving the quality of learning environment, setting standards that equip schools with the appropriate facilities, and introducing models that make schools free from violence. The Government of Egypt and NGOs, supported by UNICEF, are running 227 Community Schools in Upper Egypt which apply active learning techniques and promote community participation. In order to enhance the quality of teaching and learning processes, UNICEF is assisting the Ministry to apply the active learning methods used in Community Schools in the formal education system as well. UNICEF also provides technical and financial support to the Girl’s Education Initiative aiming to tackle the gender gap in education. The National Council for Childhood and Motherhood is leading the initiative which has to date established 760 schools reaching more than twenty thousand children in remote areas. Much of the focus of UNICEF now is also given to supporting efforts to increase the enrolment rate of children to pre-schools (kindergartens). ####
Copies of the PSA and Still Photos of Player Mohamed Aboutreika are available upon request. The PSA can be viewed at the following link:
Weaam Elleithy, UNICEF Egypt Media
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