Vice-Chancellor Professor Sir Leszek Borysiewicz has joined the call for governments throughout the world to ensure all children are afforded the right to an education by the end of 2015.
The Stand #UpForSchool petition has already attracted more than three million signatures from people around the world, ranging from UN Special Envoy for Education Gordon Brown, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon, 2014 Nobel Peace Prize Winners Malala Yousafzai and Kailash Satyarthi to celebrity names like Sharon Osbourne all joining the global call for education for all.
The petition is run through A World at School, an international campaign bringing together a movement of people from civil society, teachers, faiths, youth, business, international and non-governmental organisations demanding world leaders take immediate action to get all children into school and learning.
The Vice-Chancellor said: “At the start of the academic year I said that the University’s responsibilities go deep and wide and that at the forefront of those, education has to take pride of place.”
“Our responsibility to education starts much earlier than at the university stage. We are working globally and locally to ensure we deliver on our responsibilities. Education is a key factor in raising people out of poverty. I believe that boys and girls across the world have the right to an education, but I know that some cannot exercise that right. It is everyone’s responsibility to change this.”
A World at School was launched in 2013 in the face of the grim statistic that there are currently 58 million children out of school around the world because they are child labourers, they married too young, they are discriminated against, exploited or living in war-torn regions where their schools are under attack.
The petition states: “We, the world's youth, teachers, parents and global citizens appeal to our governments to keep their promise, made at the United Nations in 2000, to ensure all out-of-school children gain their right to education before the end of 2015.
“We are standing up to bring an end to the barriers preventing girls and boys from going to school, including forced work and early marriage, conflict and attacks on schools, exploitation and discrimination. All children deserve the opportunity to learn and achieve their potential. We are #UpForSchool."
Pauline Rose, Professor of International Education, joined the Vice-Chancellor in signing the petition.
The Stand #UpForSchool petition calls for governments to "ensure all out-of-school children gain their right to education before the end of 2015".
The signing comes just two weeks before a major debate, hosted jointly in Cambridge and London, that will examine the transformative power of education for women and girls around the world.
Entitled The Education Emergency, it will feature notable speakers including Mariam Khalique, the former teacher of Nobel Prize winner Malala Yousafzai.
The debate is part of this year’s Women of the World (WOW) Cambridge Festival which takes place on 8 March. It has been organised by Pauline Rose, Professor of International Education and Dame Barbara Stocking, President of Murray Edwards’ College.
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