Senior Editor, Rotary International 

Recognizing that education is a pathway out of poverty, Rotary and other organizations have made significant progress in increasing access to learning in communities around the world.

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Parents who were already on the edge about sending their kids to school are just going to throw up their hands and not do it.

— Carolyn Johnson

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Now, the COVID-19 pandemic is threatening to erase many of those gains. More than 91 percent of students worldwide have been impacted by temporary school closures, according to the United Nations. By April, close to 1.6 billion young students were out of school.

Some experts fear school closures and the loss of some family incomes could keep children out of school indefinitely. “We have worked so many years to get kids in school, get them enrolled, and get them to stay in school,” says Carolyn Johnson, a Rotary member from Maine, USA, who helps Rotary clubs design grants that support education. “This is going to put those efforts back years.

“Parents who were already on the edge about sending their kids to school are just going to throw up their hands and not do it,” she adds. “They are literally starving and need the money their kids can bring in working.”

91% students worldwide impacted by temporary school closures

Mary Jo Jean-Francois, Rotary International’s area of focus manager for basic education and literacy, believes that the pandemic’s impact on education will continue long after the development of a COVID-19 vaccine.

“Many kids are at a high risk of never going back,” she says. “That is a huge concern for the education community.”