Three workers of an aid agency who won a HK$30 million (US$3.86 million) prize from a Hong Kong-based global philanthropic foundation plan to help more than a million pupils in war-torn countries catch up on learning through tailor-made games within five years.
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The War Child Alliance, which has supported more than 200,000 children in Chad, Jordan, Lebanon, South Sudan, Sudan, Syria, Uganda and Ukraine through its Can’t Wait to Learn programme, uses digital technology to turn different nations’ educational curricula into games and bring personalised literacy and numeracy skills to pupils in war zones.
The alliance said it was assessing the situation in Syria, where it planned to expand the programme to more children whose studies were disrupted by the violence. An 11-day offensive launched by the rebel group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham ousted Bashar al-Assad as president.
“Unfortunately we’re not short of conflicts to work in,” Luke Stannard, programme director of Can’t Wait to Learn, said. “The demand for children to learn foundational skills and do it in a way that they enjoy to support teachers and to support education systems has never been higher.”
Stannard, together with two other colleagues at the War Child Alliance, received the 2024 Yidan Prize for Education Development for their role in the Can’t Wait to Learn programme.
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Widely regarded as the world’s highest education accolade, the Hong Kong-based Yidan Prize Foundation recognises individuals and teams who have made outstanding contributions to improving education.