It all starts with Education

Community Schools Program

Main Goal

Misr Elkheir Foundation is one of the first organizations to take the Community School initiative since 2010 after the UNESCO model with establishing and operating 1012 community school to this day.MEK had withdrawn from from  68 schools as these were handed over to the government for sustainability and payment of facilitators' salaries.

MEK has won the UNESCO prize-2018 Edition regarding its formidable impact on Girls & Women Education and significant prevention or delay of early marriage.

The Community Education Program’s main objective is providing high quality educational opportunities for dropout children and those who are being kept away from education due to lack of safety, or cultural and economic reasons from 6-14  years of age, providing socio-economic community awareness, with the aim of empowering the local community to manage these schools.

Significance and Achievements

• Providing a last chance of high-quality education for children and their communities in 476 villages and hamlets spread in 10 governorates, where educational opportunities are provided to 32,415  students
  of which there are 19,574  girls, and 12,841 boys operated  through 10 strategic NGOs and 160 local NGOs and 2024 failitators( 2 for each school). The percentage of Girls: Boys is 60%: 40%.
• Contributed to changing a number of wrong habits such as depriving girls of education and early marriage, by paying home visits to persuade families of, the importance of allowing their children especially to go to schools and be educated.
• Reducing early marriage rates for girls in these communities, and delay in the age of marriage for girls by involve girls as change agents in their schools, indulging in extra-curricular academic, cultural and sport activities such as: UCMAS, musical instruments, scouting, singing and karate for self-defense.
• Promote societal awareness and understanding of the importance of education for their children.
• Achieving a remarkable increase in safety rates of students moving from their homes to schools not exposed to road dangers such as ( drains and canals - highways – railways).

Numbers of Girls

As a piece of evidence, an increase in material community contributions to this project has been observed. Although the tribal and rural communities where the project is implemented are characterized by being socially connected, the meetings with students, parents, community representatives and facilitators have revealed that Community Education Schools have positively contributed to bolstering such social relationships among students and their families.

Misr El Kheir's Community Education Schools have contributed to changing a number of wrong habits such as depriving girls of education and early marriage. This is because the project is committed to paying home visits to persuade families of the importance of allowing their children to go to schools and be educated.

The project has achieved a remarkable increase in the safety rates of students moving from their homes to schools as there are community education schools nearby. Before that, they were exposed to such types of road dangers such as ( drains and canals - highways – railways).

As part of the ongoing endeavor of the Community Education Support Program to emphasize maximizing Misr Elkheir Foundation’s reputation for devlopment, while spreading and outreaching the most needy areas and the most vulnerable groups in all circumstances especially in the most difficult circumstances and crisis. During 2021 the focus was on achieving the strategic directions of the foundation, which included three main pillars are (sustainability - continuous development - technological transformation).

Accordingly, work has been done on planning and implementing targeted activities in each of the strategic axes, resulting in the following results:

Pillars of Community Schools Program

1-Sustainability

• Sustaining and expanding provision of high quality education in areas most in need
• Strengthening capacities of facilitators , volunteering Committees and natural leaders for activating community dialogue
• Spreading awareness to solve social and cultural norms such as early marriage and girl labor
• Promotion of Successful girls as role models in target communities to encourage other girls and oppose patriarchal stuborness
• Expanding Middle Schools for graduates of CSs
• Last year 5,381 students, of which 59% girls graduated to Grade 7 in 2024.
• Opened 7 new MEK Middle Schools in neediest communities in Upper Egypt
• Inclusion of PWDs with needed rehabilitation for facilitators and children , and available resources and engorged their hobbies

2-Constant Development for Facilitators, Committees & Students

• Conducting Active learning, multi-grading, Life Skills, career development capacity building for teams
• Supporting treatment tutorial programs for reading, mathematics, Computer Skills, and English language
• Conducting Extracurricular activities to enhance learning through sports, music and arts

 3-Digital & Environmental Transformation

• Digital equipment in community schools ( Smart Boards, laptops, and tablets)
• Digital Platform for Teachers and Committees Continuous monitoring for schools and students
• DELL Community Schools with Solar Panels called Solar Hubs in 10 Schools, and 5 Container Schools as mobile solutions for remote small communities

Impact of Community Schools Program

• Increased Credibility in MEK’s potential to operate the community education in most vulnerable poorest villages from Ministry and Partners
• Increased Funding Entities Partnerships from National Banks and International Org. such as Unicef, EU, DELL,KOTN Canada, Bahrain Trust,etc
• Expanded girls’ accessibility to quality education, enhance career development and life options in more than 476 poorest underserved communities.
• Improved gender parity ratio to 67% -70% of the school population.
• Enhanced Community engagement and mind-set change leading to declines in early marriage and FGM.

Links:

• Community Education Achievemenets 2024

• Community Education Program Achievements and Impac (PDF)