Learning Community

A regional platform for collective learning, feminist solidarity, and transformative change in education.

The FEMNET4GTE Africa Community of Practice (CoP) brings together education practitioners, feminist movements, youth-led organisations, CSOs, researchers, and advocacy networks from across the continent. Together, we generate knowledge, influence policy, co-create feminist pedagogies, and accelerate Gender Transformative Education (GTE) in Africa's education systems.

Why This Matters

Despite global and regional commitments, gender disparities in and through education remain widespread across Africa. An estimated 36 million adolescents are out of school in sub-Saharan Africa, with close to half of these being girls. Harmful norms, such as child marriage, menstrual poverty, and school-related gender-based violence, continue to deny learners their right to safe, quality education.

Efforts to address this have often been fragmented and disconnected from feminist movements. The FEMNET4GTE Africa CoP exists to change that: a unified platform for coordination, shared knowledge, and coherent advocacy strong enough to shift education systems.

Get Involved

Membership is open to education practitioners, feminist movements, youth-led organizations, CSOs, researchers, and advocacy networks across the continent committed to gender transformative education.

To apply to be a member, fill out the form HERE

Kindly see concept note:HERE

The African Union Assembly of Heads of States and Governments held in February 2023 adopted Education as the theme of the Year 2024. This will be a single opportunity for the African Union to re-galvanize Member States towards achieving CESA and SDG4 targets. Importantly, this will come as a follow-up to the Specialized Technical Committee on Education, Science and Technology (STCE-ST4), AU-High Level Side Event (HLSE) Declarations, the Urgent Call for Action by the SDG4 High-level Steering Committee and the UN Secretary General’s Vision Statement on Transforming Education. This community affords the NECs the opportunity to continue knowledge sharing and strategizing on how to effectively engage with this theme for 2024.

Education must enable students to take a leading role in its transformation process while actively contributing to more just and sustainable societies and the well-being of people and the planet. Education systems need fundamental reform to achieve these two aims simultaneously. GCE's learning around transforming education is centred around our strategic advocacy areas focused on: 

1. Technology and digital opportunities
   
2. Quality Climate Change Education (QCCE)
   
3. Education leadership and civil space
   

The Youth Engagement Learning Community is coordinated and managed by the GCE Secretariat. The Secretariat sets up the communities and develops the process for effective coordination and implementation of activities to achieve the desired results and impact. During the current strategic period, the engagements in the Youth Learning Community will be centred around critical education issues outlined in the Youth Engagement Strategy as in the Youth’s advocacy and campaign priorities listed below:

1. Climate change and greening education
2.  Inclusive education
3. Gender equality 
4. Financing of education
5. Education Technology

The engagements in the IEEC Learning Community will are centred around the following critical topics relating to inclusive and early childhood education advocacy and campaign priorities, aligning with the 2023-2027 advocacy and campaign priorities of the GCE Movement. 

1. Disability inclusion  
2. Inclusion of historically excluded populations and groups 
3. Transformative ECCE

The Gender Learning Community aims to cultivate and strengthen the GCE movement's common understanding of gender and the capacity to mainstream gender through targeted gender-conscious learning and knowledge generating to inform joint advocacy actions and influence gender frameworks in education policy. The engagements in the Gender Learning Community will be cantered around key pillars that are critical to GCE's advocacy and campaign priorities on gender, including :

1. Gender equality and non-discrimination
2. Gender-responsive education in conflict and crisis
3. Gender-responsive education financing

The engagements in the EiE Learning Community are centred around the following three critical education in emergencies advocacy and campaign priorities aligning with GCE’s 2023-2027 advocacy and campaign priorities. 

1. Crisis-sensitive and inclusive education planning and budgeting
   
2. School safety, security, protection (psychosocial support and socio-emotional learning)
3. Education for refugees, IDPs, returnees, asylum seekers, migrants and stateless people

However, should members of the community wish and suggest exploring other topics that may not be directly linked to the topics indicated, these will be considered for integrating in the plans that will be developed for each year.

The engagements in the Education Financing Learning Community are centred around six critical education financing advocacy and campaign priorities outlined below: 

1. Increasing investment in education systems, from early childhood through to adult learning in education
2. Protecting education budgets, including in times of austerity and debt crises
3. Increasing financial investment in education to both long-term development aid for education and humanitarian aid for education in emergencies
4. Advocating for tax justice
5. Exposing and working to end the privatisation and commercialisation of education 
6. Ensuring accountability for education investments, aid and debt.

This is a global repository of the  Learning Hub built to bank knowledge and learning products, tools and resources generated from the work of the GCE movement and global community working to advance access to quality education.  GCE members, partners and global education partners can can access the repository for the following purposes:

1. Online engagements and collaborations
2. Share learnings 
3. Disseminate resources
4. Collect materials and resources

GCE encourages new contributions and feedback on published resources as part of the ongoing collaborative efforts on learning.