2025 Flagship Report: Acting Ahead to Protect Education Investments - Geneva Global Hub for Education in Emergencies
With humanitarian needs at an all-time high, the need to act ahead of crises has never been higher. Across the globe, 234 million crisis-affected children need educational support, 85 million of whom are out of school. The situation is compounded by unprecedented and drastic funding cuts. National governments, donors, aid practitioners and others have no choice but to invest increasingly limited resources to maximise impact – in particular through anticipatory approaches.
Acting Ahead to Protect Education Investments – Why the need for proactive approaches to crises is more urgent than ever, the Geneva Global Hub for Education in Emergencies’ 2025 Flagship report released on 12 June 2025, sets out how the right investments ahead of crises can save both lives and resources, while protecting the education and futures of millions of children and youth. Crises may be unavoidable, but their worst impacts are not.
Key findings:
Acting ahead of crises is no longer just an option, but a must. While we’re still discovering the full extent of the effects of drastic funding cuts, it is abundantly clear that all actors must use scarce funds in the most impactful way. There is mounting evidence from across sectors that anticipatory approaches can save lives, reduce costs and maximise limited resources.
Despite crises becoming more predictable, aid remains largely reactive. Only 1% of humanitarian funding is allocated to risk reduction more broadly, and just 0.2% to so-called anticipatory action (targeted action ahead of specific, predictable hazardous events). This leaves communities and children exposed to preventable harm. Funding for anticipatory action remains hard to access, in particular for local actors.
The education sector has long been critically under-resourced as a whole, and education remains underfunded in anticipatory frameworks. Just 50.3% of requested funds for humanitarian interventions were met in 2024, while Education in Emergencies received only 29.9% of what was required. Education is also widely neglected in anticipatory action funding, ranking ninth of 13 sectors in such resources received from the Central Emergency Response Fund (CERF) from 2020 to 2024.
Acting ahead is crucial to safeguarding education investments amid the increasingly severe impacts of climate-related disasters and conflicts, and to limit learning interruptions. Anticipatory approaches help prevent negative coping strategies such as families pulling children from school, skipping meals or selling vital assets. While the education sector has long embraced principles of acting ahead more broadly, anticipatory action has only recently begun to gain traction as evidence of its benefits emerges. The challenge is now to double down on efforts to embed these approaches more systematically through policies, strategies and financing.
Acting ahead in education creates a virtuous cycle. Integrating education in anticipatory efforts will strengthen communities’ own efforts to act ahead of crises. Schools can provide unmatched reach into communities, particularly to marginalised groups. They also offer the most direct and effective channel for engaging children and youth as both rights-holders and agents of change. This is key to ensuring that their perspectives help shape anticipatory approaches.