We declare our commitment to the sustainable development goals, and we work specifically in order to ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all, as the driver of individual and collective development and urban transformation that makes our cities more just, more empathetic and inter-cultural. To build cities where everyone can enjoy full equality and where we can join in dialogue and live together while respecting our differences.
Today we can affirm, beyond doubt, that education has breached the walls of the schools and has spread across the entire city, permeating its neighbourhoods, public spaces and institutions. However, we can also objectively see that numerous mis-educating factors and phenomena still persist in our cities.
Aware of the challenges we face, we are committed with conviction and determination to countering these regressive phenomena by putting forth a city policy model that places people at the core of our priorities and which, based on education, provides coherence, drive and meaning to our actions, as a tool for social transformation, cohesion and mutual respect.
Educating cities endeavour to make education the transversal axis of all local policies, by becoming aware of and reinforcing the educating potential of actions and programs in the field of health, the environment, town planning, mobility, culture, sport, etc.
We endeavour, therefore, to democratize access to all city’s assets so that each city space can be a source of education in which everyone can live, enjoy and emancipate themselves, taking maximum advantage of the opportunities that the city has to offer in order to meet their expectations with civic-minded, democratic attitudes. A city respectful of the environment and in dialogue with its surrounding cities and rural areas.
We pursue a participatory democracy by uniting the proposals and efforts of civil city in jointly building better cities where no one is left behind. In order to achieve this ambitious goal, we are committed to citizen education, and to the establishment of the mechanisms necessary to formulate, implement and evaluate public policies with the participation of an active citizenry endowed with a critical, committed co-responsible spirit.
This is a road that very different cities from all continents have shared and which has a history of more than 25 years since the proclamation of the Charter of Educating Cities. That is why we join the celebration of the International Day of the Educating City with the wish to garner every day the support of more people, associations, companies, institutions, etc., to enthusiastically work for a comprehensive, replenished and emancipatory education. And we invite all cities large and small from all latitudes to join us in this audacious, hope-inspiring endeavour to engage in building better Educating Cities for a better World.