Commemorating United Nations Day: EF Explore America partners with the United Nations Association of the United States of America (UNA-USA)

in News· 1 min read

Seventy-five years ago, on October 24, the United Nations officially came into being. While United Nations Day this year comes during a time of global challenges, it reminds us that difficult times can often bring positive change – especially when we take a moment to learn about the world around us.

And that’s precisely what EF Education First‘s domestic educational travel business, EF Explore America, does – helps middle and high school teachers build positive change for their students.

To further EF’s mission of opening the world through education, EF Explore America recently launched an exclusive partnership with the United Nations Association of the United States of America (UNA-USA), a program of the UN Foundation and Better World Fund. For decades, the UNA-USA has engaged communities around the world to support the United Nations’ ideals and vital work.

Through this educational partnership, teachers and students across the country will have the opportunity to participate in conversations and actions that help support the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals and the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. These goals are “a universal call to action to end poverty, protect the planet and improve the lives and prospects of everyone, everywhere.”

“We are thrilled to begin developing and hosting learning workshops, both in-person and virtually, for students and teachers traveling with EF Explore America,” says Troy Wolfe, Senior Director of Partnerships & Special Initiatives at UNA-USA/UN Foundation. “Our goal is to engage them in productive, actionable conversations around the global issues we are looking to solve for, while also encouraging them to take their learnings back home to their communities.”

Inspiring youth to take action and helping them develop real-world skills have long been part of the EF experience. EF Educational Tours and EF Explore America host annual EF Global Leadership Summits that ask thousands of student attendees to use design-thinking to develop solutions to pressing global challenges.

Beyond EF’s summits, the Hult Prize, named after EF’s founder Bertil Hult, is the world’s largest student-driven competition for social good. Here student teams are challenged to solve a social issue by developing a sustainable social enterprise. The annual competition crowd-sources social business ideas from students all over the globe to create solutions to some of the world’s most pressing challenges. Hult Prize is a collaboration with the United Nations, and the U.N. features the event as part of its Global Goals Week held in New York City each September.

Looking for a way to participate in this year’s United Nations Day? Join the UNA-USA for an online global engagement series on Friday, October 23 at 12 p.m. EST.