‘Sesame Street’ awarded $100 million grant to bring interactive education to refugee children

Sesame Street just won a hefty award to bring educational programming and a humanitarian response to children displaced by war and conflict in the Middle East.

Sesame Street and the International Rescue Committee were awarded a $100 million MacArthur Foundation grant on Wednesday to build an early-childhood education program for kids dealing with "toxic stress" in Jordan, Lebanon, Iraq, and Syria. An estimated 9.4 million children will be able to use the specialized programming.

Last year the beloved children's TV show and the global humanitarian aid organization IRC partnered to focus on programming for the youngest refugees and displaced children.

Now as grant recipients, Sesame Street and the IRC (who were selected out of 1,900 proposals) are building a digital, TV, mobile, and in-person curriculum that aims to provide tools for these kids to handle the trauma that comes with displacement and surviving in a conflict zone.

Learning is a main component — reading, language, math, and socio-emotional skills will come packaged in a new local version of the show. The Muppets will focus on special topics like inclusion, respect, and gender equity. This content will all be available at no cost and be available through TV programs, on mobile phone, and other digital platforms.

Also part of the grant will focus on home visits and caregiver support sessions for 1.5 million children. Similar in-person sessions at child development centers at schools and other locations throughout the affected region will encourage play-based learning. These learning centers will have storybooks, videos, activity sheets, and training guides.

This is much more than a TV show.