[{"bbox": [96, 152, 1165, 260], "category": "Text", "text": "government policy reforms and avoid legitimising the coup d'état, and focus instead on responding to basic needs of an increasing number of people and communities in vulnerable situations, and supporting civil society. The EU adjusted its ongoing portfolio, accordingly, including the full suspension of the Education Sector Budget Support programme."}, {"bbox": [96, 298, 504, 323], "category": "Section-header", "text": "## Overview of the education sector context:"}, {"bbox": [96, 350, 1165, 511], "category": "Text", "text": "As a consequence of the dual crisis, Myanmar is facing an acute learning crisis. The school closure due to the COVID-19 pandemic during most of 2020 and 2021, and the coup with all its consequences, have affected the learning of millions of children and youth as they are facing significant challenges in continuing their education. The context is characterized by an increased politisation of education, and a deteriorating security situation⁹. Since the coup, at least 216 attacks against schools and school personnel have been reported by early December 2021, along with incidents of military use of education facilities (209) by the security forces.¹⁰"}, {"bbox": [96, 536, 1165, 670], "category": "Text", "text": "According to the latest data, 9.7 million learners in total were enrolled in Myanmar's basic education system for the 2019-2020 academic year. This number includes an estimated 300,000 students enrolled in Monastic schools. An estimated 420,000 children¹¹ are in addition attending schools managed or supported by ethnic basic education providers (EBEPs). Across Myanmar, an estimated 2.7 million children were already out of school prior to the COVID-19 pandemic and the coup on 1 February 2021¹²."}, {"bbox": [96, 695, 1165, 1146], "category": "Text", "text": "There is limited information regarding the effective functioning of schools which depend on information from the de facto Ministry of Education (MoE). The MoE announced that it is continuing the implementation of the Kindergarden (KG) + 12 years of education system, which was only introduced in the 2016-2017 academic year in the framework of the 2016-21 National Education Sector Plan (NESP) of the previous government. In this 2022-23 academic year, the de facto MoE will conduct more Training of Teachers activities for selected grades and for new curricula during this and next year. In parallel, opposition National Union Government (NUG), declared a 'terrorist organisation' by the de-facto authorities, presented an interim education plan which cover basic education, TVET and Higher Education (HE). It promotes home-schooling as an alternative education for those students who do not want to attend de facto MoE schools, and prepared learning resources that are available online. The NUG also plans to distribute offline materials. Currently, a large share of donor funded programmes in education have been suspended. Development partners prepared a Joint Response Framework (JRF), serving as a broad operational framework guiding engagements and framing and informing future interventions in the education sector. The development of the JRF included consultations with a number of stakeholders and was finalised in March 2022. The JRF is an important tool to ensure that the response to the education needs in this challenging political and operational context is provided in a coordinated, coherent, aligned, and transparent way. It has been developed considering Education in Emergency (EiE) needs. The JRF covers a duration of three years (2022-2025) and is foreseen to be reviewed annually and on an ad-hoc basis if necessary."}, {"bbox": [96, 1172, 1165, 1439], "category": "Text", "text": "Education is a fundamental human right and one of the main foundations of human development. It is a pillar of the Global Gateway Strategy¹³, and is part of the EU strategy for cooperation in the Indo-Pacific¹⁴. Myanmar ratified the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) in 2017, which establishes the right to education. The action aims at contributing to basic needs and rights of the Myanmar population, particularly the children and youth, and will ensure an important attention to equity as it will focus on the children living in the most vulnerable situations, including out of school children and children with disabilities. Attention will be paid to gender equality. The action supports the Commission's priority on Sustainable Growth and Jobs by contributing to the access for the children and youth in Myanmar to the foundational skills needed for life and work. It also contributes to the priority on digitalization as it will be contributing to laying the foundations for digital skills through early year literacy and numeracy. This action should also support the priority on Governance, Peace and Security, as education can"}, {"bbox": [86, 1481, 255, 1505], "category": "Footnote", "text": "⁹ Draft JRF_310322"}, {"bbox": [86, 1505, 313, 1528], "category": "Footnote", "text": "¹⁰ as of 6th December 2021"}, {"bbox": [86, 1529, 187, 1552], "category": "Footnote", "text": "¹¹ JRF 2022"}, {"bbox": [86, 1553, 1144, 1597], "category": "Footnote", "text": "¹² Ministry of Education, UNESCO International Institute for Educational Planning and UNICEF. (2018). *Myanmar Report on Out-of-School Children Initiative* (OOSCI)."}, {"bbox": [86, 1597, 911, 1623], "category": "Footnote", "text": "¹³ https://ec.europa.eu/info/strategy/priorities-2019-2024/stronger-europe-world/global-gateway_en"}, {"bbox": [86, 1622, 228, 1644], "category": "Footnote", "text": "¹⁴ JOIN(2021)24"}, {"bbox": [1038, 1681, 1143, 1705], "category": "Page-footer", "text": "Page 5 of 25"}]