Edmund Rice International

Members of the Edmund Rice Network in Kenya have demonstrated their support for the Millennium Development Goals by their participation in the recent Stand-Up against Poverty campaign. One of the actions involved a march through local streets as a means of ensuring their voices were heard by the delegations attending the Millennium Summit and by […]

Young people representing over 30 countries held their 7th International Summit at the United Nations in Geneva. ERI had the privilege of participating with these dynamic young minds. Professional inputs were provided by a series of individuals whose job was to motivate the youth to discussion of relevant Human Rights topics. This was very well […]

Dr Kishore Singh an international law expert from India and an internationally recognised authority on the right to education, has recently been appointed by the UN Human Rights Council as the Special Rapporteur on the Right to Education. Dr Singh has most recently been working as Senior Programme Specialist for the right to education, at UNESCO […]

Free primary education (FPE) was introduced in Kenya in 2003 resulting in a dramatic increase in the number of children enrolled in schools. The influx of additional pupils has impacted negatively on the quality of education provided – for example overcrowded classrooms, lack of teachers and inadequate infrastructure but nevertheless many children still do not […]

Of all the tragedies afflicting youth, one of the hardest for workers to handle is youth suicide. The numbing effect of grief, the undertow of despair, often render our efforts fruitless. Yet Brendan McCarthy cfc in Kolkata, and his co-workers, run an NGO called SERVE, which says it all – Students’ Empowerment, Rights and Vision […]

The goal of providing universal primary education by 2015 seems to be slipping out of reach according to the Global Campaign For Education (GCE) According to a UNESCO Global Report released earlier this year, 72 million children were out of school in 2007 and 56 million would still be out of school by 2015 if […]

Sometimes an email will arrive on my screen like a breath of fresh air. Daniel Devincenzi, from the City of Beautiful Breezes (Buenos Aires), sent me one with the refreshing title you see above. Isn’t that an idea to move the Edmund Rice Network to work? Colegio Cardenal Newman (yes, he who is moving towards […]

When the noisy swirl of day students has emptied the playground of St Joseph’s Bow Bazar, in downtown Kolkata, a quieter little procession of rather ragged kids enters the roomy classrooms. These are the Ashivad students and their clothes, though clean, comes from the crushed pile of belongings that their families keep beside them on […]

Tucked away in the south-east corner of Jarkhand, Bongera is a collection of villages where some of the poorest children we teach walk, in sandals or bare feet, upwards of an hour each day to school. Apart from the rice their families may grow in the shallower valleys, they rely on the forests around them […]

Two big schools, St Patrick’s and St Vincent’s, and a trades-training centre, are now embedded in two eco-parks, thanks to the work of Brother Frank Gale, many young men training to be Brothers, and the local staff and students. Ponds, trees, a vigorous undergrowth, and wildlife give a glimpse of the local ecosystem that almost […]