End Child Poverty

     Ending poverty has become a defining goal for this generation, which we all aspire to achieve and want to support. But sadly, the reality is children remain disproportionally affected. Millions of children around the world remain poor and deprived of what they need to develop and thrive. The Global Coalition to End Child Poverty is a global initiative to raise awareness about children living in poverty worldwide and support international and national action to alleviate it. The Global Coalition to End Child Poverty was initiated by groups of organizations with a common interest and focus on child poverty. Together they oversee our work and activities to ensure we make progress against our mission. Our members meet annually and have regular calls to coordinate our work.

      The Global Coalition operates within a worldwide network structure without formal headquarter, secretariat, and sponsorship. The members are African Child Policy Forum, Arigatou International, ATD Fourth World, BRAC, Bristol Poverty Institute, ChildFund Alliance, EuroChild, Equity For Children, FXB Centre Harvard University, Institute of Development Studies, OECD, Overseas Development Institute, Oxford Human Development, and Poverty Initiative, Partnership for Economic Policy, Plan International, Save the Children, SOS Children's Villages, Social Policy Research Institute, The African Child Policy Forum, The UN Major Group on Children and Youth, UNICEF, World Vision International, Young Lives Oxford University. UNICEF and Save the Children, as the group's conveners, are responsible for the management and synergy of the group.

      The Global Coalition strives to make sure children are considered part of poverty eradication efforts at every level, from their families and communities to countries and globally, and support action to end child poverty.

     Global Coalition supports the UN efforts to reduce child poverty as part of the Sustainable Development Goals and works with national governments, civil society, international organizations, and individual champions to end child poverty.

Its mission statement advocate for ending child poverty as part of the new "sustainable development goals" and promotes country policies that guarantee no child is left behind.

       Poverty is a major cause of social tensions and threatens to divide a nation because of income inequality. The vicious cycle of poverty means that lifelong barriers and troubles are passed on from one generation to the next. The effects of child poverty on education in developed countries alone reveal some disturbing statistics:

• Children from poor backgrounds are behind at all stages of education.
• More indigent children are nine months behind children from wealthier backgrounds by the age of three.
• By the end of primary school, students receiving free school meals are estimated to be about three terms behind their peers.
• By fourteen, this gap increases to over five terms.
• By sixteen, children receiving free school meals are about 1.7-grade points below their more affluent peers’ average GPA.

 Many of these studies on poverty focus on childhood poverty, and these studies make it very clear that childhood poverty has lifelong consequences. In general, poor children are more likely to be poor as adults, more likely to drop out of high school, become a teenaged parent, and more likely to have employment problems. 

However, there is hope on the horizon as many organizations are working individually and collaboratively to raise awareness and understanding of poverty’s impacts on children in more affluent and more impoverished countries and the practical solutions to address it. Many have become children’s voices by participating in crucial poverty debates and influencing policies to address the child poverty issue. Many organizations like save the children, world vision, Global Coalition, e.t.c, have effective programs and policies that address child poverty and deprivation among the most impoverished children. The endpoint is to end child poverty through these various actions and policies.

                                                      Reference

http://www.endchildhoodpoverty.org/read-me