Earlier this month, Teach For All network partners, alumni, and staff members contributed to discussions at the World Innovation Summit for Education (WISE) in Doha, Qatar. Over 2,000 attendees from nearly 100 countries convened to discuss innovations in the education sector under the theme "Co-Exist, Co-Create: Learning to Live and Work Together."

On November 14, the Center for Global Education at Asia Society, Teach For All, Results for Development, the Boston Consulting Group (BCG), and WISE co-led a third convening of the Global Education Ecosystem informal working group for a full-day working session on the topic of “How to strengthen a global education ecosystem to foster a learning and sharing infrastructure to advance learning outcomes to achieve the UN Sustainable Development Goal 4 (SDG 4).” This session, along with a series of others that have taken place this year, furthered a conversation around the Education Commission Learning Generation Report’s recommendation to strengthen global learning and sharing infrastructures for education in order to realize SDG 4.

The session gathered 70 global and regional education stakeholders representing civil society, government, bilateral and multilateral institutions, the private sector, and foundations. Speakers included WISE CEO, Stavros Yiannouka; Commissioner of the Education Commission and Former Minister of Tourism of Tunisia, Dr. Amel Karboul; former Chair of the Association for Education Development in Africa (ADEA) and former Minister of Education in Zimbabwe, Dzingai Mutumbuka, among others. Participants shared examples from their own work of successful networks and capacity development efforts to spark discussion about how these components best align to achieve the goal of improved learning outcomes. To more widely share the cumulative learnings of this group, BCG has invited the 200+ stakeholders who have engaged with the Global Education Ecosystem initiative since April to consult on a set of refined investment guidelines for strengthening a global infrastructure. These guidelines will feature the collective learnings of participating organizations and will be featured in a report published by BCG in early 2018.

On November 15th, Teach For All CEO and Co-founder Wendy Kopp joined Executive Director of Learn Labs, Dr. Simon Breakspear, for a discussion about developing high-impact leaders. The panel addressed questions such as, “What makes an effective leader?” and “What training, skills, and capacities do education leaders need?” The dialogue explored the idea of leadership development as a complex and adaptive process deeply rooted in local cultures and environments. “We need local leaders to be exposed to what is working in other places,” shared Wendy. “There is no need or time to reinvent the wheel. Solutions are shareable.”