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GADRRRES

Asia Pacific Coalition for School Safety

Asia Pacific Regional Affiliate

Established in 2012, the Asia Pacific Coalition for School Safety (APCSS) is a Regional Affiliate of the Global Alliance for Disaster Risk Reduction and Resilience in the Education Sector (GADRRRES). The APCSS aims to create a space at the regional level for discussion and sharing of technical resources, good practices/lessons learnt and model policies on Safe Schools to minimize the impacts of disasters on children’s education and to coordinate and promote advocacy for Comprehensive School Safety, across Asia-Pacific countries.

In addition to core members (Plan International, Save the Children, World Vision International, UNICEF, UNESCO, IFRC, ADPC and UNDRR), the APCSS maintains its cooperative linkages with two sub-regional platforms in Asia-Pacific (sub-regional members): Pacific Coalition For The Advancement Of School Safety (PCSASS) and ASEAN Safe School Initiative (ASSI), as well as other collaborative members, such as: ChildFund, UN Major Group of Children and Youth (MGCY), and All India Disaster Mitigation Institute (AIDMI).

Purposes

To promote Comprehensive School Safety – advocacy at regional, sub regional and country levels.
To coordinate and collaborate with stakeholders on school safety.
To develop and share technical resources, good practices, policies and lessons learned – knowledge management.

Key Priorities

1 Organizational Development and Communications: prioritise communication ahead for joint comments and collective communication
2 Shared Repositories for Efficiency, Impact Research, and Scaling-up: Tools for sharing of both published IEC and curriculum materials as well as raw materials for adaptation and development.
3 Collaborative Work on guidance, publications and tools: Collective support for tools for capacity-building in policy planning for Comprehensive School Safety .
4 Development of Evidence-based guidance: Develop small projects for Participatory Action Research in connection with child-centered programs.
5 Advocacy, capacity building and partnership for Comprehensive School Safety in Asia-Pacific: Identify priorities for outreach, advocacy presence, engagement and partnership development.
6 Link with regional strategies of UN agencies, donors, Global Partnership for Education, and other regional bodies.

Accomplishments

  • Regional launch of the Comprehensive School Safety Framework 2022 – 2030 in Asia-Pacific in 2023 (virtual event)

  • Report: “Guardians of the planet: Asia Pacific Children and Youth Voices on Climate Crisis and Disaster Risk Reduction Report” – Report, Webinar recording, Infographic summary

  • Webinar recording on “Inclusive policy and practices in education continuity for the most-at-risk girls and boys”

  • Webinar recordings on the inter-agency resource “Safe Back to School: A Practitioner’s Guide”: Session 1, Session 2

  • Children Stakeholder Group Statement – Asia-Pacific Partnership on Disaster Risk Reduction Forum 2019
    - APCSS support to GADRRRES Side event on school safety at the Global Platform for Disaster Risk Reduction 2019 in Geneva, Switzerland:
    - Report: “Enhancing the Enabling Environment for Education Continuity in Multi-Hazard Settings in ASEAN”
    - Report: “Towards School Safety in ASEAN: A compilation of case stories from the children who participated in promoting school safety”
    - Video: “Standard Operating Procedure for school disaster preparedness in ASEAN”

  • APCSS Statement for Comprehensive School Safety implementation – Third ASEAN Conference on School Safety

  • Asia-Pacific Ministerial Conference on Disaster Risk Reduction in Brisbane, Australia in 2022:
    - Partner Event: “Recipes for Success to Scale up Comprehensive School Safety (CSS) Across Asia-Pacific”
    - Market Place – presentation of learning materials, tools and promotion for the updated Comprehensive School Safety Framework 2022-2030.

  • Asian Ministerial Conference on Disaster Risk Reduction in Mongolia in 2018:
    - Thematic event: Promoting investment in disaster risk reduction through good examples of child-focused Comprehensive School Safety implementation in different contexts and innovative education solutions.
    - APCSS market place: Presentation of good practices, showcasing tools, modules, and findings from research at regional and country levels
    - Side event: Safe Schools: Researcher, Practitioner and Policy-maker

  • Collaboration for evidence-based practice
    - Side event: Risk-Aware and Disaster-Ready Generation towards Sustainable Community Resiliency
    - Side event: Collaborative Surge – Enabling localisation enhancing resilience
    - Side event: Making Schools Safer in Asia

  • Asian Ministerial Conference on Disaster Risk Reduction in India in 2016:
    - Policy Brief on Advancing Comprehensive School Safety for Asia-Pacific
    - Thematic session: Promoting educational continuity and resilience of children and community through increasing child-focused Comprehensive School Safety in different contexts and innovative educational solutions
    - Technical Session: Investing in DRR for resilience

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Grupo Regional de Educación para Latinoamérica y el Caribe
West and Central Africa Education in Emergencies Working Group
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