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Community engagement is crucial for controlling disease outbreak and mitigating natural and industrial disasters. The COVID-19 pandemic has reconfirmed the need to elevate community engagement to build equity, trust and sustained action in future health promotion preparedness strategies. Using the health promotion strategy of strengthening community action enhances the opportunity for better outcomes. There is, therefore, a need to improve our understanding of community engagement practices during crises, scale-up good community engagement initiatives, and improve and sustain people-centered approaches to emergency responses. This paper presents five case studies from the United States, Singapore, Sierra Leone, Kenya and South Africa that demonstrate the potential strengths that can be nurtured to build resilience in local communities to help mitigate the impact of disasters and emergencies. The case studies highlight the importance of co-developing relevant education and communication strategies, amplifying the role of community leaders, empowering community members to achieve shared goals, assessing and adapting to changing contexts, pre-planning and readiness for future emergencies and acknowledgement of historic context. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

COVID-19 pandemic has eroded gains towards Kenya Vision 2030's poverty eradication goal by denying Kenyan children and youth with disabilities access to (quality) education. Situational analysis on the impact of COVID-19 pandemic on education of primary and secondary schoolage individuals from March 2020 to December 2020 reveal that the education opportunities for learners with disabilities remained unpredictable as the disease ravaged communities to the end of the year. Learners with disabilities fell behind academically after school closure and COVID- 19 related biases predisposed them to academic failure and failed adulthood. Then, the implementation of disaster education and recovery plans are overdue and must intentionally target education of children and youth with disabilities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

On 30 January 2020, the World Health Organization declared the coronavirus disease of 2019 (COVID-19). After reporting its first COVID-19 case on 12th March, 2020, Kenya closed down all its learning institutions on 15th March, 2020. Subsequently, the Ministry of Education (MoE) developed the Kenya basic education COVID-19 emergency plan to guide the response and management of COVID-19 pandemic in schools. In spite of this plan, schools in Kenya remained closed for the next six months, with devastating effects on the academic, physical, and psychosocial wellbeing of many learners. In addition, COVID-19 has continued to spread within learning institutions even after re-opening on 6th October, 2020. The purpose of this study was to examine the capacity of Kenya's education sector in preventing, responding to and managing disease pandemics, such as the COVID-19. A desk review included the analysis of key national and education sector documents to determine how disease pandemics are categorised within Kenya's education sector; the elements of Kenya's education sector disease pandemic response and management framework; the capacity levels of the Kenyan MoE's disaster response and management (DRM) framework in responding to the COVID-19 pandemic; and recommendations to reinforce or redesign the MoE's current DRM framework. This study was anchored on Wenger's (2017) Prevent-Prepare-Respond-Recover framework which emphasises the aspects resilience and adaptability as key to an organisation's ability to rise from a disaster, rebuild and transform itself for posterity. The findings indicate that the element of 'whole system planning' with regards to DRM was strongly evident in several of the education sector documents, but challenges still persist in the aspects of anticipation, avoidance, accommodation, response, and recovery. Thus, the measures put in place to address disease pandemics appear to restore the status quo rather than enhance the education sector's resilience and adaptability. Therefore, it was recommended that the MoE should place emphasis on whole system renewal and provide the requisite resources in order to strengthen its DRM framework; consequently, creating a transformational DRM system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

COVID-19 is reshaping education. UNESCO estimates that at the peak in April 2020 COVID-19 disrupted the education of 1.5 billion enrolled learners in schools and universities in 190 countries. This period of unparalleled educational interruption has prompted a rapid reaction, a move to explore online distance learning solutions. Simultaneously, it has exposed the challenges and complexity of distance learning utilising Educational Technology (EdTech). Despite the many technological innovations, these challenges are not new to refugee learners, their educators and remote learning technology providers. In this article, the authors sought to explore frontline practitioners' 'lived experience' of providing education utilising EdTech when education is disrupted by forced displacement. A small scale, explorative, qualitative study was conducted with educators in refugee camps and urban settings, in Greece, Jordan, Kenya and Rwanda, prior to the pandemic. Expert interviews revealed that EdTech programmes cannot be a stand-alone solution. Blended learning programmes that are context-specific, modular, optimised for mobile technology and delivered by trained and supported teachers are the most effective. The article ends with a reflection on how these findings can be applied globally when learning is disrupted by whatever means and lead to an equitable and sustainable recovery for all. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]