Event

The organising committee for the UNGEI E4 conference is made up of education activists, academics, practitioners and policy makers from many countries of the world. We are seeking papers and presentations that deal with gender, education, empowerment, and equality for our innovative E4 conference in May 2010. Although, over the last ten years, children around the world have had increased opportunities to attend school and benefit from education, nearly a billion people still receive little or no education.

The majority are women and girls who face gender inequalities in many areas of their lives. The harsh effects of climate change, war and economic recession impact particularly heavily on women and girls, and if not addressed, will place enormous obstacles in the way of their education. This conference is part of a world-wide mobilisation of partnerships to realise the rights of girls and women to education and training and address the gender inequalities that prevent initiatives from reaching their full potential to transform societies. The key theme of the conference is: Partnership, participation and power for gender equality in education

Parallel streams will look at:
·         Addressing violence
·         Challenging poverty and inequalities
·         Beyond access: Policy and practice for gender equality in schools

Cross cutting themes will consider:
·         Health, water, nutrition and HIV
·         Participation
·         Climate change

What will happen at E4?

Through presentations, papers, discussions, and video conversations, we will review  ten years of the work of UNGEI and other organisations concerned with gender and education, looking at different forms of participation and the challenges of working collaboratively. In the work of the conference we aim to bring more voices into the conversation to deepen understanding of policies and practices in education that can support  gender equality and the empowerment of women, reflect on what we have been doing and how we can support each other and thus accelerate progress on gender equality and empowerment in education.

Be part of E4!

E4 aims to bring together activists of all types—practitioners on the ground, national and international policy makers, researchers—who work on gender and education. Together we will engage with each other tackling the question of partnership, participation and power for gender equality in education and addressing the E4 themes of ‘Engendering Empowerment: Education and Equality’.

Bring your ideas to the conference! Since partnerships are at the centre of any successful change, we are particularly interested in presentations and papers developed through collaborations, such as:

• Campaigning alliances concerned with girls, women or gender working to change education policy or deliver schooling
• Young adult activists or founders of organizations whose missions and goals are related to gender and education and any of the main conference themes (violence, poverty& inequity, school conditions)
• NGO activists who work with youth in and out of school
• Partnerships between policymakers and practitioners/activists
• Academics working collaboratively in the global south, or south–north
• Collaborations between academics and policy-makers/ practitioners/activists

We particularly welcome papers and presentations in the following areas:

• Connections between schooling, gender, poverty and other forms of discrimination and subordination
• Gender and the quality of educational provision (curriculum, teaching, management, school conditions, connections with work and family life)
• Gender based violence in and on the way to school
• Gender and education in societies in conflict and in post –conflict situations
• Gender, education and climate change
• Gender, education and nutrition/water and sanitation/HIV & AIDS (or any area connected with health policy)

Offering a paper

We are seeking a great diversity of people and highly focussed time working together. If you are interested in participating in E4 by offering a paper please go to http://ocs.e4conference.org/ 

Participating in the e conference

If you are interested in participating in the web discussions, receiving e-mail alerts etc, please go to http://www.e4conference.org/

Who is supporting E4?

E4 has been organised by UNGEI (UN Girls’ Education Initiative). UNGEI was formed in 2000 as a global partnership of governments, civil society, multilateral agencies and the private sector to narrow the gender gap in education and ensure girls and boys everywhere in the world enter and complete schooling.

Where will E4 take place?

Our face-to-face conference will take place in Dakar, Senegal  17-20 May 2010. Between February and May 2010 there will be opportunities to participate in the conference in many ways through e-discussions and SMS.

E4 languages

The main languages for the face-to-face conference will be English and French. The web discussions will, in addition, use a wide range of languages (eg. Spanish, Portuguese, Hindi, Mandarin, Bangla, Kiswahili).