For one year, reporters from Zeitenspiegel have been searching in twelve countries around the world for stories that show what a difference education can make in people's lives. The project partner is Frankfurter Rundschau. The global research project is supported by the European Journalism Centre (EJC) and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
A girl attending school or a day laborer being trained for a good job – such seemingly everyday occurrences hardly make for world-changing news. However, on the whole, education is the key factor for development in the world's poorest countries. But how can such stories be told in a way that they are also printed and read?
Since June, Zeitenspiegel has been producing print features and video interviews for the Frankfurter Rundschau and the roughly three dozen other newspapers and online portals of the Ippen publishing group. The research teams' objectives are in twelve of the so-called Least Developed Countries, those poorest countries in the world where only a small part of the population has access to education so far. The reports are intended to provide insights into how broadening one's own horizons promotes personal emancipation and professional and social advancement – and thus represents an important step for the development of entire societies.
We tell the stories of people whose lives have fundamentally changed thanks to access to education – and who then go on to shape other people's lives. Their life stories show: education opens up new opportunities. Knowledge is power. It is not for nothing that the Pakistani Nobel Peace Prize laureate Malala Yousafzai, who survived an assassination attempt by the Taliban in 2012, named books and pens as the most important weapons against poverty and terrorism. „One child, one teacher, one book, and one pen can change the world,“ Yousafzai said in a speech to the United Nations. „Education is the solution.“
The reports in this series will first appear in the „Magazin“ of Frankfurter Rundschau and will subsequently be published in a shortened version in the newspapers and internet portals of the Ippen Group. The global research project is supported by the European Journalism Centre (EJC) and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
An overview of the reports published so far:
Not to be seen and yet to be seen
Sign language and braille books should not be a luxury. Says José Diquinssone, who fights for the inclusion of people with disabilities in Mozambique.
The Reportage by Rike Uhlenkamp (text) and Rainer Kwiotek (photos) has appeared in the Frankfurter Rundschau from May 29, 2021.
The Flying Classroom
In Afghanistan, education is often life-threatening. But the organization Ofarin doesn't just give the country's children hope.
The Reportage by Markus Wanzeck (text) and Uli Reinhardt (photos) has been published in the Frankfurter Rundschau of July 22, 2021.