The Diplomat
The State Secretariat for International Cooperation will organise tomorrow, at the Casa de América headquarters in Madrid, the First Round Table on Business and Cooperation for Digital Education on the occasion of International Education Day, which is celebrated today.
The aim of this “pioneering initiative” is to “promote public-private partnerships abroad for the digitisation of schools and internet connection for students from vulnerable households in Spanish Cooperation partner countries”, according to a press release from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
The round table, which is supported by the E-duc@ programme of the Spanish Agency for International Development Cooperation (AECID), will be inaugurated by the State Secretary for International Cooperation, Ángeles Moreno Bau, who will explain during the event the priorities of her department in the field of education. Also present at the meeting will be the State Secretary for Digitalisation and Artificial Intelligence, Carmen Artigas; the State Secretary for Trade, Xiana Méndez; the State Secretary for Education, Alejandro Tiara; the Director of the AECID, Magdy Martínez Solimán; and Rafael Duque, an expert in public-private partnerships from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).
From the private sector, 26 companies and foundations linked to education and telecommunications will participate, including Telefónica, Hispasat, Microsoft Ibérica, Escudo Web, Grupo Mondragón, OTBInnova, Grupo-AE, Didactalia, McGraw Hill, Planeta, Santillana, Anaya, SM, Rubio, ISDI, Coverwallet, Siemens-Gamesa, Elecnor, Santander Universities and the Foundations of Telefónica, Orange, Vodafone, Pro-Futuro, Banco Santander, BBVA and Mapfre.
Nearly 1.6 billion students around the world have been forced to drop out of school and go home because of the pandemic. According to UNICEF, some 5.9 million students in Asia, 5.3 million in Africa and 2.1 million in Latin America will no longer go back to school. “In its Joint Response Strategy to the COVID-19 Crisis, Spanish Cooperation prioritises the protection and recovery of the rights of the most vulnerable, including children and adolescents who have seen their right to education eroded, especially refugees, displaced persons, children with disabilities and in contexts of humanitarian crisis”, the Ministry explained.
