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UNICEF and its partners are driving an innovative solution called Accessible Digital Textbooks for All, to make textbooks available, affordable and accessible for children with disabilities in all contexts. By adding specific features to digital formats and following Universal Design for Learning principles, textbooks can be made accessible to students who are blind or have low vision, to those who are deaf or hard of hearing, and to those who have intellectual, developmental or learning disabilities, among others. The initiative brings writers, publishers, teachers, organizations of persons with disabilities, technologists and ministry of education representatives together to develop the guidelines needed to produce textbooks in accessible digital formats. They jointly set standards for features like narration, sign language, interactivity and the audio description of images.

UNICEF is currently piloting the Accessible Digital Textbooks for All Initiative in Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda, Nicaragua, Paraguay and Uruguay throughout 2019, 2020 and into 2021. The goal of the pilots is to test and validate the process of creating quality accessible digital textbooks with the ministries of education and different stakeholders using curriculum-based content, and to measure the learning outcomes for children with and without disabilities using them.

In the light of the COVID19 pandemic and with the aim to support a disability-inclusive response to the crisis, International Disability Alliance (IDA) has launched this hub-page to share the most recent updates and resources as they become available.

Links are provided to resources from IDA members, partners, by disability constituency, by United Nations system and by country. Recommendations are also available. 

This website summarises cash transfer programming. 

WHO is gathering the latest scientific findings and knowledge on coronavirus disease (COVID-19) and compiling it in a database. 

A list of educational applications, platforms and resources aiming to help parents, teachers, schools and school administrators facilitate student learning and provide social care and interaction during periods of school closure. Most of the solutions curated are free and many cater to multiple languages. While these solutions do not carry UNESCO’s explicit endorsement, they tend to have a wide reach, a strong user-base and evidence of impact. They are categorized based on distance learning needs, but most of them offer functionalities across multiple categories.

A fully searchable bibliographic database concerned with the study and practice of national, regional and international public health. The database has a Coronavirus collection. 

Each month the Global Health site has a monthly focus on an important public health issue and provides a related news item, a useful smart search, and a selection of focussed records, book chapters and CAB reviews.

May 2020's focus topic is Coronavirus and Mental Health

The NHS have produced an ‘easy on the i’ information design service within the Learning Disability Service at Leeds and York Partnership NHS Foundation Trust. A repository of images has been created to help support the creation of easy to read documents.

To garner insights into successes and challenges in building inclusive education approaches in sub-Saharan Africa, this study examines experiences implementing a project aimed at improving educational opportunities for children with disabilities and other vulnerable children. This project, which was implemented by Humanity & Inclusion in partnership with Educate A Child (EAC) from September 2016 to November 2019, was designed to adapt and contextualise cross-national approaches to inclusion and promote innovative approaches aligned with local priorities and systems. The project was implemented in ten Sub-Saharan African countries and included goals to improve the access to and retention in primary school for vulnerable children, especially children with disabilities. The project goal was exceeded in enrolment of vulnerable children, ultimately enrolling 32,525 out-of-school children (OOSC) and meeting 116% of the initial target of 28,011, with a 78% survival rate.

This case study describes implementation strategies and experiences from the project. The inclusive education approaches used in each country; policy and systems changes attributed at least in part to the programme; the role of contextual factors in the successes and challenges faced within each country; and the influence of EAC contributions on the project are examined. The case study includes special attention to the innovative approaches pursued in some project countries, i.e., itinerant teacher schemes used in Togo, Burkina Faso, Mali, and Sierra Leone; the use of school life assistants to support inclusion in Senegal; and the role of bridging classes in Madagascar. Specifically, the following research questions are pursued, drawing on a desk review of project documents, qualitative survey responses, and key informant interviews. 

The African Network for Evidence-to-Action on Disability (AfriNEAD) facilitates networking among researchers, persons with disability, government representatives, business and civil society within the African region as well as with international communities to ensure that research contributes to a better quality of life for people with disabilities in Africa. This website contains information about its network, symposia, discussions, research and resources. Links are also provided to archives and related websites