Global School Partnerships is funded by UKaid from the Department for International Development (DFID) and run by The British Council, Cambridge Education Foundation, UK One World Linking Association and Voluntary Service Overseas. It is designed to strengthen a school’s capacity to adopt a ‘whole school approach’ to global education, through an active partnership with a school in a developing country.
The GSP offers support and guidance to teachers and grants to schools to make the most out of a school partnership as a learning tool. It aims to support 5,000 UK school partnerships by March 2012.
Video showcasing a Global School Partnership between Warden Park School in Sussex, England and Little Flower School in Chennai, India
DFID has also sought opportunities to build a more direct relationship with young people themselves in order to raise awareness about development and highlight the work organisations do to combat global issues.
This has included the production of resources or ‘products’ for educationalists and schools e.g. Joint DCSF (formerly DfES)/DFID publication ‘Developing the Global Dimension in the School curriculum’; World Classroom – developing global partnerships in education, joint DFID/Treasury publication; ‘Change your school for good’ case history booklet on good practice in the classroom; New DFID publication offering guidance for educationalists – Bringing the World into the Classroom, and the DFID Global Study Planner which gives students information about development in their mandatory homework diary.
We have also sponsored events that target school children (e.g. the annual Global Student Forum) and encouraged direct outreach to schools through visits by DFID ministers and inviting school groups into DFID.
We have also commissioned some research into what works well in order to gather evidence and promote good practice, for example ongoing research into the impact of school partnerships. DFID is also jointly funding the new ‘Development Education Research Centre’ within the Institute of Education.
There is regular contact around issues of joint interest concerning the inclusion of global issues in the curriculum (across all four UK jurisdictions), including as part of the wider social cohesion agenda.
Officials from DFID meet regularly with Department for Children Schools and Families (DCSF) officials on areas for collaboration; similarly with Welsh, Scottish and Northern Ireland education ministries, to ensure complementarities with national strategies. We are currently exploring how we can further deepen and strengthen our collaboration with DCSF.
More recently, DFID has also begun to develop activities to engage young people in development through non formal channels. This includes the volunteering scheme called Platform2 (managed by Christian Aid and BUNAC and launched in February 2008) to fund young people from less advantaged backgrounds to volunteer in developing countries, and we are considering support to other initiatives that aim to engage young people through broader channels.
For more information, visit the British Council site.
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