Education Empowerment Project Through Protection for the Most Vulnerable Learners in Baidoa 01/04/2019
While Education and protection concerns are not new to Baidoa, the recent drought and resulting crisis and displacement, as well as increased fighting in certain areas of Somalia, has left residents of Baidoa increasingly vulnerable. Women and children, especially among IDP communities are facing the main consequences. Abuses such as physical assault, recruitment of children into militias, abduction, high drop-out cases have been reported by a number of agencies all of which gravely affect learning processes. 

The project is designed to reach IDP children of school going ages to: 
1) Provide immediate child protection for the most vulnerable children through awareness creation and support to the child to child clubs 
2) Increase resilience through the provision of basic education and support to school-based resilience mechanisms that will contribute to the sustainability of education programs
3) Build the capacities of teachers and CECs to better respond to child protection issues and better manage school resources.

The project targets 8 primary schools in Bay region affected by the protracted crisis in South West State. READO in response to emergency-affected learners in the larger Somalia has proposed this project to mainly retain 3051 learners (1434 girls) and 48 teachers (24 female) and 28 CECs (14 female) at school in mitigating the case of high school dropout rate following effects of prolonged drought crisis. The project will focus on the provision of quality learning opportunities through
 Provision of quality Teaching and Learning Materials in 8 public primary schools
 Water provision in 8 schools and complimentary food provision in 8 public primary schools targeted aimed at improving the quality of learning by contributing to physical and mental growth of learners.
 Providing teacher incentives to 48 teachers and head teachers spread over the 8 targeted schools aimed at improving the quality of life.
Providing protective learning environments for most vulnerable learners through
 Training of 48 teachers and 28 CECs on child protection issues including PSS, DRR spread over the 8 targeted schools.
 Rehabilitation of 8 classrooms in the 4 Primary schools targeted.
 Rehabilitation 8 separate gender appropriate latrines,12 hand washing facilities, 3 water tanks for three schools.
And build the capacities of teachers and CECs to better manage school resources with a focus on finding sustainable solutions through
 Training of 48 teachers and 28 CECs on management of school resources
 Establish child to child clubs at school, referrals of cases, tracing and unification.
READO will manage to address Education concerns brought about by the drought in the schools that READO has been supporting with the help of volunteer teachers. This will also act as entry points to address other emergency related concerns like AWD outbreaks in schools, school health screening and aid provision challenges. 
By implementing this work in such a manner, READO is ensuring to not only build up the resilience, capacity and education opportunities available to vulnerable groups in Baidoa, but to improve the capacity, coordination and cooperation between the different groups and administrations within the city.