The REAL centre builds on the Faculty of Education’s strong expertise in research of the highest quality that aims to address real problems and influence policy on the ground.
- Vice-Chancellor, Professor Sir Leszek Borysiewicz
A new centre that will focus on understanding the barriers to education among disadvantaged children, and on identifying solutions to overcome those barriers, was officially launched in Cambridge this week.
The Research for Equitable Access and Learning (REAL) Centre, based within the University of Cambridge’s Faculty of Education, aims to promote education as an engine for sustainable development, and to pioneer research into overcoming obstacles to education including poverty, gender, ethnicity, language and disability.
The launch event at Corpus Christi College’s McCrum Lecture Theatre brought together speakers including Julia Gillard, former Prime Minister of Australia and current Chair of the Global Partnership for Education, and Dr Hans Brattskar, State Secretary of Norway’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, to discuss the subject of “Achieving social transformation through education”.
Welcoming the keynote speakers, the Vice-Chancellor of the University of Cambridge, Professor Sir Leszek Borysiewicz, said: “The launch of the REAL centre is an opportunity to celebrate education, and girls’ education in particular, and to underline the importance of education as a key to social transformation.”
He reminded the audience that “the REAL centre builds on the Faculty of Education’s strong expertise in research of the highest quality that aims to address real problems and influence policy on the ground. It will focus on the challenges of the most marginalised –including girls from poor households, or those with disabilities—in the poorest countries, notably in Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia.”
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Image Credit: DFID - UK
Reproduced courtesy of the University of Cambridge
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