High-Level Security Council Arria Formula Meeting

During this event, we will explore:

• What practical steps Member States can take to implement Security Council resolutions related to identifying school location and connectivity, and providing infrastructure and access to schools, particularly in conflict and post conflict settings.
• How Member States, particularly those with a generation growing up in or directly after conflict, can more effectively adopt and integrate digital technologies for distance learning (See: UNICEF’s Re-imagine Education) and other public sector digitalization (see: SG Action Plan Recommendation 1B: Digital Public Goods & Norway’s Digital Public Goods Alliance), and what special considerations will be most relevant in these contexts.
• What (potential) challenges could implementing agencies face in expanding distance learning to children affected by armed conflict, and how the Security Council can help overcome these challenges.
• How and where private sector technologists can play a bigger role in accelerating connectivity for all, and who should be engaged and how Member States can help broker those engagements at the highest level.
• What practical steps Member States can take to close the digital divide and extend connectivity to learners in conflict and post-conflict settings. 
• Particular post-conflict risks and opportunities for funding/de-risking platforms for connectivity, and how Member States can lead convening of investors, funders, industry and government to build a funding platforms particularly for countries affected by conflict that create a market for universal access to connectivity for learning, including (re-) establishing infrastructure for broadband.