Let Our Children Teach Us! A Review of the Role of Education and Knowledge in Disaster Risk Reduction

This 148-page review document is commissioned for the United Nations (UN) International Strategy for Disaster Reduction (ISDR) Thematic Cluster/Platform on Knowledge and Education and ActionAid. The purpose of this review is to evaluate good practices in attempting to reduce disaster risk (including efforts to protect schools from extreme natural events) through education and innovation. It reviews key activities of Priority 3 of the Hyogo Framework for Action 2005-2015, an international commitment by 168 countries to implement a global disaster reduction agenda. Priority 3 states: “Use knowledge, innovation and education to build a culture of safety and resilience at all levels." The document's goal is to develop further strategies for two initiatives on disaster risk reduction: the ActionAid schools project and the UN campaign “Disaster Risk Reduction Begins at School”.

According to the document, three subjects are most urgent and central to education for disaster risk reduction:

1. Teaching about hazards and risk reduction
   in schools.
2. Schools as centres for community-based
   disaster risk reduction.
3. Physical protection of schools from natural
   hazards.

In short, the strategy is to enable "at all levels, pupils and students, from primary school to post-graduate study... [to] actively study the safety of their own schools and work with teachers and community members to find ways to protect them..., [as well as to] spread the methods of participatory vulnerability and capacity assessment and hazard mapping to the broader communities surrounding schools and other institutions of education and research." Constraints listed in the review are: lack of universal primary education (Millennium Development Goal (MDG) 2), low pay and poor support of teachers, and dangerous locations of schools. Further constraints are listed as:

• "Brain drain and brains down the drain
  [Unemployment/mal-employment,
  HIV/AIDS, violence, declining life expectancy and disability-adjusted life years
  (DALYs)].
• Scientific dominance by most developed countries and transitional countries (heavily-indebted poor countries and Africa left behind).
• Information and communications technology imbalances (“digital divide”).
• Persistent natural science/social science
  split (the “two cultures”).
• Gap between research and action
  (“the last mile”)."

The review finds potential in the possibility of integrating the study of earth sciences and the focus on disaster preparedness and drills. It suggests potential in the participation of communities in their own local curriculum development, beginning with taking students outside into the community to study hazards and community resources for disaster. It also recommends better linkages in all levels of education and research, the application of both available science and local knowledge, more South-South networking, and a better connection between bottom-up efforts - students, teachers, and communities, and top-down efforts - governments, UN, and national and international non-governmental organisations (NGOs).



Chapter 7: "Action" contains specific gaps and opportunities with recommended actions for each level of school as well as the educational infrastructure, community-based disaster management, media and communication, science and research, and knowledge networks. It selects 9 focal points for which it recognises and names some institutions as having potential to lead worldwide disaster risk reduction efforts as a network. It then lists short-term targets and long-range strategies.


Among specific points on media and communications are the following:

• Gap: According to this review, despite the efforts of communication specialists, a critical mass of journalists and broadcasters has not yet
  rallied to the cause of disaster risk reduction. [Editor's note: This
  document suggests that The Communication Initiative does not have any
  information related to risk or disaster. On the contrary, The CI does indeed
  have information on risk and disaster. As of June 2007, a search for "risk"
  reveals over 1,000 matches, and a search for "disaster" reveals over 220
  matches.]
• Gap: Games and risk-awareness aids for children and youth use approaches that "fail to explore the true nature of risk reduction."
• Opportunity: It recommends that "those engaged in public risk awareness should partner with the insurance industry and study their public communication methods. For example, in Australia, ten insurance and reinsurance companies have partnered with a university to provide a web-based tool for the public to assess risk to flood, wildfire, coastal storm, earthquake and hail. This kind of partnership could be more common."
• Opportunity: It identifies the need for a "critical mass of journalists to create a new kind of reporting on disasters, one with more attention to root causes that follows the successes of prevention."

Among communication-related strategic starting points are teacher training and training of trainers, community participation in making schools into centres for community disaster risk reduction, mobilisation to protect schools from natural hazards and to reduce risk in schools, and youth participation in training and message dissemination to families and communities. In conclusion, the document provides evidence of the need for an internationally coordinated effort for both disaster reduction planning and action in the education and knowledge production sector.