121 million children around the world cannot go to school. We're working to change that.

121 million children are not being given the chance to go to school. Millions more are in school but failing to learn. From building schools and training teachers, to connecting orphaned or abandoned children with families, and offering people the chance to generate their own income, our sustainable, holistic model is all about giving the world's poorest children a chance. 

Street Child started in Sierra Leone in 2008 working with a small number of street children.  Since then we have helped over 120,000 children to go to school and enabled 22,000 families to generate sustainable incomes so that their children can stay in education. During the Ebola crisis, Street Child helped over 20,000 Ebola orphans, providing emergency support and connecting them with families.

Today, Street Child works in Sierra Leone, Liberia, Nigeria, Uganda, Nepal, and Sri Lanka with a current emphasis on education in emergencies and girls' education.

An Afghan street boy photographed in downtown Kabul, Afghanistan (June 2003).

Street children ,  are children experiencing poverty, homelessness or both, who are living on the streets of a city, town, or village. Homeless youth are often called street kids or street youth; the definition of street children is contested, but many practitioners and policymakers use UNICEF’s concept of boys and girls, aged under 16 years, for whom "the street" (including unoccupied dwellings and wasteland) has become home and/or their source of livelihood, and who are inadequately protected or supervised.

Street girls are sometimes called gamines, a term that is also used for Colombian street children of either sex. Some street children, notably in more developed nations, are part of a subcategory called thrown-away children, consisting of children who have been forced to leave home. Thrown-away children are more likely to come from single-parent homes.Street children are often subject to abuse, neglect, exploitation, or, in extreme cases, murder by "clean-up squads" that have been hired by local businesses or police.