Lessons From Ebola: How To Reach the poorest children when schools reopen

When I joined the UNICEF Sierra Leone office as the chief of education in 2014, the country was at the peak of its Ebola epidemic. I walked straight into a crisis that had put over 1.8 million school-going children and adolescents out of school. The effects of Ebola are terrifying. But like many public health crises, their impact on human lives go far beyond just health. In West Africa, the epidemic’s impact on learning was devastating too. Closure of schools and universities caused serious setbacks to educations systems, resulting in loss of learning and higher drop-out rates. The closures also increased violence against children, teen pregnancies and early marriages.

In Sierra Leone, schools were closed for nine long months to stem the spread of the epidemic. This meant that thousands of children across country were idle and out on the streets…………………………………….