Global Youth Ambassadors S/Hero Week: meet our disability champion Saul

• We have over 900 passionate young education advocates from across 90 countries, working tirelessly to ensure every child and young person has access to inclusive quality education and training to get the best start in life.
• They are the Global Youth Ambassadors for Theirworld and our A World at School movement. Every day they are doing truly inspiring work, often at the forefront of Theirworld’s campaigns and key focus areas, from early childhood development to inclusive education – both globally and locally. 
• Global Youth Ambassadors S/Hero Week is a celebration of their exceptional work both as a network and in recognition of key outstanding individuals as voted by their peers. Each day this week in our Their News channel we will be highlighting how integral our Global Youth Ambassadors have been in each campaign or focus area and announcing the 2018 Global Youth Ambassadors Campaign S/Heroes.

Today the Disability S/Hero award goes to a Global Youth Ambassador who has shown “outstanding work to ensure access to inclusive quality education for children and young people with disabilities”.

He is…

Saul is a committed youth activist who has been working towards inclusive education in Tanzania. 

He started a campaign called “Disability is not an inability” at his school, where he interviewed visually impaired students to raise awareness of the issues they were facing. He also worked with Mvumi School Trust – a UK charity supporting blind students – which donated Braille machines for the school. 

Saul spoke at the UN General Assembly’s High Level Sustainable Development Goals Event on Education in New York.

His fellow Global Youth Ambassadors said he is making an “immense contribution to disabled children in Tanzania” and is “putting disability on the map”.

Saul said: “Let’s keep soaring higher and see further beyond limitations and make our world a better place, no matter the circumstances. We should never stop doing what matters the most for the present and the future generations.”

Estimates say there are at least 93 million children with disabilities in the world but the numbers could be much higher.

Theirworld has been campaigning for urgent action to be taken on inclusive pre-primary education. This year saw the publication of our policy brief Left behind from the start: how governments and donors are failing children with disabilities in their early years, highlighting the needs of children with disabilities in the early years. 

Our insightful Global Youth Ambassadors Nandini Kochar (Botswana), Mark Mathew Operiano (Philippines) and Mohammed Yaaseen Edoo (Mauritius) contributed their thoughts on the importance of inclusive education for children with disabilities. 

Too many under-fives are being let down by their governments and donors. The UK in partnership with Kenya co-hosted its first Global Disability Summit this year in London, in line with the principle of “nothing about us, without us”. 

The event was led by people with disabilities and our Global Youth Ambassadors Kirthi Jayakumar (India), Diksha Dinde (India), Marabi Amfaal Hydara (Gambia), Mobasshera Amin (Egypt), Shafiul Islam (Bangladesh) and Jeffrey Kibet (Kenya) took action during Theirworld’s Disability Week leading up to the summit to raise awareness of the barriers faced by children with disabilities. 

Ceion Rollox (Guyana) and Mohammed Yaaseen Edoo (Mauritius) created videos to inspire action.

Sarah Mwikali Musau (Kenya) is dedicated to breaking down the barriers to quality inclusive education for all, focusing especially on people with disabilities. Sarah is founder of the Gifted Community Centre, which aims to create awareness on inclusive education and disability through activities like live Twitter chats.

Daniella Akellot (Uganda) is a disability campaigner and advocate, raising awareness of and breaking the disability barrier for children in Uganda. She is a research scientist, working for the Uganda Post-Injection Prevention Program, namely with children suffering from the post-injection disability gluteal fibrosis. 

Daniella identified how this affected the way the children would relate with other children in the school since this disability made it difficult for them to sit properly on classroom benches or play with classmates. Daniella has written several blogs for Theirworld to raise awareness of disability.