Professor Paul Connolly, interim Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Research and Enterprise and Project Lead will be delivering a keynote, and an interdisciplinary team of leading academics from the Centre for Evidence and Social Innovation (CESI) including Dr Sarah Miller and Dr Laura Dunne from the School of Social Sciences, Education and Social Work at Queen's will be in attendance. The team will be participating in this event having travelled directly from Bogotá where they co-hosted a public event and series of meetings with key early childhood NGOs and government advisers to explore the development of ECD programmes for peacebuilding in Colombia.

The NIHR Global Health Research Group on ECD for Peacebuilding network was set-up in 2017 to examine the potential for ECD programmes to promote sustainable development and peacebuilding, and establish an international network of researchers from six low and middle income countries (LMICs) that have been affected by ethnic divisions and political violence. 

The network is part of the international Early Childhood Peace Consortium hosted by UNICEF and seeks to support the development and evaluation of ECD programmes in societies affected by conflict. 

Professor Connolly said: "We are delighted to be attending Yale University, one of our key partner institutions, for the next NIHR Global Health Research Group on Early Childhood Development for Peacebuilding meeting. 

 

"Working in strategic partnership with UNICEF, our international research network is taking the lessons we have learnt from Northern Ireland and applying them in a number of different low and middle income countries throughout the world. A key element of this research is exploring how ECD services can make a positive contribution, not just to sustainable development and economic growth for these countries, but also in helping to build social cohesion and peace. 

 

"We look forward to hearing from world-leading experts in the field and contributing to the discussions."