Girls’ Education Challenge: Lessons Learnt

The Girls’ Education Challenge (GEC) was launched by the legacy Department for International Development, now the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) in 2012 as a 12-year commitment to reach the most marginalised girls around the world. Through the GEC, the UK aims to transform the lives of over 1 million of the world’s most marginalised girls through quality education and learning.

GEC projects are implementing a diverse range of innovative interventions in a variety of different contexts. They are financing access to education, providing materials for learning, and creating safe spaces to learn. The projects are also helping to mobilise and build capacity within governments, communities and schools, and training and mentoring teachers, governors, and community leaders. They are supporting girls to seek out and secure their full potential. There are currently 41 projects across 17 countries.

BEI is proud to bring together in a panel FCDO, the 4 main GEC providers and the program’s independent evaluation Tetra Tech to reflect on the past 10 years of work. The alliance partners will seek to provide their top lessons learnt from their roles in the GEC, and support likeminded organisations in understanding how to manage challenges in programming, as well as how successes can be replicated in future programmes.

During the second part of the event, FCDO will seek to open the floor to both our panelists and the event’s attendees seeking input into how should FCDO continue to support the world’s most marginalised girls through education.

Agenda:  

16:00 – 16:30 – arrival over tea & coffee

16:30 – 18:00

• BEI introduction to speakers (10 mins)
• FCDO Overview of GEC (8 mins)
• Cambridge Education, Mott MacDonald – technical focus on programme implementation and constraints (8 mins)
• PwC – financial management and risk (8 mins)
• Social Development Direct – safeguarding perspective (8 mins)
• Nathan – evaluation perspective – (8 mins)
• Tetra Tech – independent evaluator (8 mins)
• Q&A on Lessons learnt  (20 mins)
• What next? FCDO let conversation on how should FCDO and British organisations continue to position themselves as global leaders in Gender education initiatives? (20 min)

18:10 – 19:00 – Networking over drinks & soft drinks