Educate A Child (EAC) along with its partners, has invested $1.2bn for enrolling out-of-school children in quality primary education from around the world so far, disclosed a top official. 
Launched in 2012 by Her Highness Sheikha Moza bint Nasser, EAC is a global programme of the Education Above All (EAA) Foundation.
“We have an overall commitment of enrolling 10mn out of school children. So far we have completed funding for over 7mn children. Around 5.3mn have already been involved in the system,” Dr Mary Joy Pigozzi, executive director, EAC told Gulf Times.
“Our first commitment was 6mn children and the target for the first year was half a million. We have achieved the target and changed the overall target to 10mn. We are working very hard to realise the target very soon,” continued Dr Pigozzi.
“We have identified 10mn out of school children but not completely funded them yet. We are in the process of finalising the proposals for 3mn children. We will soon sign a few more agreements and complete the target. Some of the projects that we started in the first years, have been completed already,” explained the official. 
EAC works to provide out of school children faced with extreme poverty, cultural barriers, and conflict-affected environments an opportunity to enrol in quality primary education.
Dr Pigozzi said that EAC works with several UN agencies, international NGOs as well as local NGOs. “We have had so far 62 partners. Some of the projects have been completed already. We are working in 48 countries. Our partners include a number of UN agencies, leading international NGos as well as local NGOs," she stated. 
"Most of our activities are in Sub-Saharan Africa as well as South Asia. Half of the countries we are working are in conflict or post conflict situation such as Yemen, Syria, Iraq among others," noted the official.
According to her the amount of funding for education has not gone up though the number of out of schoolchildren has gone up considerably in the recent years.
“EAC has a co-funding model. Each partner has to bear at least 50% of the project. EAC works with the partners and provide programmes according to the needs of the community they are working. It does not have any single programme. It always focuses on quality programme under the national education curriculum for out school children. Our motto is to find them, enrol them and keep track of them,” she maintained.
EAC also works on school rehabilitation, construction and training and support. It has built over 2,500 new schools 6,600 classrooms and refurbished over 4,000 schools and 10,000 classrooms. Since its inception, EAC has also provided over 3.5mn individual training days.