10th Global RCE Conference, Yogyakarta, Indonesia

1. Unmaking Disasters:
Education as a tool for disaster response and disaster risk reduction
Dr. Philip Vaughter – UNU-IAS

2. Overview
 Education on disasters tends to focus on response and recovery, and
not reducing disaster risks before they strike
 Because managing disaster risk is integral to the Sendai Framework
for Disaster Risk Reduction, education systems must move beyond
responding to disasters and work actively to prevent them, through
curriculum that reduces risk and builds resiliency

3. Recommendations for Content
 Design curriculum to fit needs of local population
 Russian Federation provides good example of using regional adaptation
on national education policy
 Policy not only takes account of geographic variation, but cultural
diversity as well
 Design education material not only about response to disaster, but
to build awareness about disaster risks that have been built into
development of local region

4. Recommendations for Content
 Educational material that promotes disaster risk reduction should
include knowledge and practices of the region’s indigenous peoples
 Examples may include land-use patterns, building designs, and harvest
schedules used by indigenous peoples
 Top down policies tend to miss important nuances between regions
that indigenous knowledge systems may be aware of

5. Stakeholders to Engage
 Migrants, Foreign Residents, and Tourists
 Because of increased mobility, people now live in and travel to areas of
the world with disaster risks with which they are completely unfamiliar
 Municipal governments can provide information on disasters and
disaster response in orientation packages for newcomers
 Tokyo Metropolitan is one successful example of this, where education
material on disaster risk in provided in a number of different languages
 A next step could be for tourist bureaux and travel companies to
highlight this type of education material

6. Stakeholders to Engage
 Effective DRR education requires educators and policymakers to
promote gender equality and the full inclusion of women and girls
in any education initiative
 Research examining mortality during disasters has shown nations with
higher levels of education among women and girls experience lower
levels or mortality during and following disasters (Striessnig et al., 2013)
 Beyond issue of inclusion, education materials related to health,
safety, and conflict in post-disaster environemnts need to ensure
issues facing women and girls are explicitly addressed and not
marginalized or omitted (Enarson, 2012).

7. World Atlas of Gender Equality in
Education (UNESCO, 2012)

8. World Atlas of Gender Equality in
Education (UNESCO, 2012)