The Palestinian self-rule enclaves are encircled by vast Israeli-controlled areas and cannot develop without Israeli permits for activities like building water pipelines and new schools, upgrading a road or building a gas station.
This is a way to create jobs, to create orders for factory-made machinery, to spur innovation by modernizing schools, upgrading research laboratories, easing transportation via high-speed rail and more efficient roads and ports.
Specific activities will include providing pre-fabricated classrooms and buildings as soon as possible; identifying existing buildings that can be used as temporary schools; upgrading water and sanitation in schools; building new schools and/or additional classrooms; and rehabilitating existing schools.
The fund has provided over 250 library grants of up to $10,000 each and has helped 70 schools upgrade their art spaces with grants of up to $20,000 each.
The mayor's plan calls for $4 billion to build or lease 76 new school buildings and $4.6 billion in improvements like wireless computer networking in all schools, upgraded science labs and new safety equipment, including surveillance cameras.
Californians tend to approve bonds for school upgrades, and a poll conducted in April suggested that they were likely to favor a statewide measure in November.
The petitions call for placing a tax measure on the November ballot asking voters to increase income taxes nearly $1 billion a year to pay for school upgrades and new accountability efforts.
UNICEF is working to improve education, approaching the challenges from a variety of angles, including establishing partnerships with community and religious leaders; providing furniture and school supplies; and upgrading schools through the provision of latrines and safe drinking water.
For many schools, increased demand for school meals would mean upgrading school kitchens and staff to keep pace, with less than a year to do so.
The Jamaican system of secondary education is highly stratified with schools divided into traditional high schools and upgraded secondary schools, paralleling Jamaica's socio-economic class differences [ 4, 22].
