Education as an alternative to child marriage

Education as an alternative to child marriage

Desperate to give daughters a safe life, some refugees marry them off early. One organization in Lebanon is showing girls that there is an alternative. Batoul, age 13, in an Alsama classroom in Lebanon. Batoul came to Alsama two years ago illiterate because her...

Girls face barriers to education due to poverty, cultural norms and practices, traditional gender roles, societal pressure and gender inequality. Katharine Lake Berz looks at how education and gender equality play a crucial role in redressing the balance and keeping girls worldwide from early marriage.

Exercise: Read the article. Use the ‘Questions to Consider’ below it as a starting point for discussion. Find out more about the importance of girls’ education and think about why it should be a priority. For further reading and research, use the following information on girls’ educationGirls Not BridesWorld Bank. Discuss why this issue should be a priority and how it relates to SDG 4 and SDG 5. You could screen this ‘School is just the start’ TED Talk by Angelina Murimirwa (8min) and discuss the key points in groups.

Growing food on arid land

Growing food on arid land

Little grew in the Sahel region of North Africa, until the World Food Program helped people revive a traditional farming practice and resuscitate the land. Resilience land rehabilitation site in Niger during the rainy season. Photo courtesy of the World Food...

When we release a river

When we release a river

Taking down massive dams is one thing. Now can we restore the land to what it was a century ago? The Copco 1 Dam reservoir in Hornbook, California 17 September 2023, before the dam was breached in January 2024 and the water drained. (AP Photo/Haven Daley) This article...

Well, I’ll be dammed! Correspondent Liam Gwynn dives into rivers, dams and the devastating environmental impacts of dams on river ecology.

Exercise: In groups, choose one of these five nature restoration projects. Read the summary of the project, follow the link to further reading and watch the accompanying video. Take notes, discuss and think about the environmental and social issues surrounding these projects. Who is involved in the rewilding projects? Who will benefit from them? What will nature restoration achieve? Next, imagine you are running the project and need funding. Present your project to the class in the form of a 3-minute project proposal pitch. Once every project has been presented, the class votes on which project they would fund.

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