Goal and objectives of the Accelerate Initiative

The goal of the Accelerate Initiative is to help countries in sub-Saharan Africa to accelerate the education sector response to HIV and AIDS.
 
Working with country teams, the Working Group identified five key objectives:

1. To promote leadership by the education sector and create sectoral demand for a response to HIV and AIDS.
2. To harmonize support among development partners, so as to better assist countries and reduce transaction costs.
3. To promote co-ordination with the national AIDS authorities, and enhance access to AIDS funds.
4. To share information on HIV and AIDS that has specific relevance to the education sector.
5. To strengthen the technical content and implementation of the education sector response to HIV and AIDS.

Key elements of the Accelerate Initiative are sub-regional and national workshops that bring together education (including key formal and non formal sub-sectors), health and HIV teams to share good practices and develop more effective strategies that result in implementation at the school level.
 
Sub-regional workshops intended to lead to a common understanding of the role the education sector could play in responding to HIV and AIDS, and thus to the emergence of sectoral leadership and action at the country level.

Effective leadership at the country level, combined with appropriate technical input, is intended to result in more effective sectoral policies, strategies and implementation plans, and better harmonized support from country level education donor teams. The philosophy of the Accelerate Initiative is to promote bottom-up planning and activism, informed by regional and national, proven examples of good practice. This is intended to lead to the establishment of programs with strong local ownership, capable of accessing suitable funding and implementation at all levels of the education sector.