Every October, hundreds of organisations across Scotland come together to engage with the Poverty Alliance’s Challenge Poverty Week – a week dedicated to raising awareness of the injustice of poverty, building solidarity, and showing that poverty is not inevitable.

This year, Challenge Poverty Week ran from Monday 6th to Sunday 12th October, with dedicated themes highlighted each day.

Despite being one of the wealthiest and most resourced nations in the world, the levels of child poverty in Scotland remain unacceptably high. Today, in 2025, more than one million people in Scotland are living in poverty – a figure that has barely shifted in the last twenty years. The most recent data shows that 80,000 Scottish children are living in very deep poverty, and around 240,000 (1 in 4) are living in relative poverty after housing costs.

The current First Minister has said that eradicating child poverty is one of the Scottish Government’s key priorities. Whilst this ambition has been both welcomed and shared by the EIS, the reality is that the picture in respect of child poverty in Scotland remains bleak, and its consequences are manifesting in the classroom and impacting the life chances of young people every day.

Teachers and schools alone cannot – and should never be expected to – deliver the solutions to poverty. The causes and growing complexities of poverty and inequality in Scotland extend well beyond the school gates. However, schools are uniquely placed to help alleviate some of the devastating impacts of poverty, and teachers play an invaluable role in this work.

Whilst Challenge Poverty Week presents an important opportunity to engage with anti-poverty initiatives and highlight the impacts of poverty, the EIS believes that tackling the scourge of poverty and deep inequality is an ongoing endeavour throughout the course of the year, not just during Challenge Poverty Week.

That is why the EIS is committed to expanding our bespoke anti-poverty professional learning programme for teachers – PACT. PACT offers teachers the opportunity to deepen their knowledge, exploring the nature, causes, and consequences of poverty. It also supports teachers in considering ways to mitigate the impact of poverty in the classroom and wider school community through policy, pedagogy, school ethos, and culture.

PACT sessions are organised nationally by the EIS Education and Equality Department, with various upcoming sessions being held across Glasgow, Edinburgh and Dundee. However, PACT sessions can be tailored to be delivered within individual schools or through local associations upon request. If you’d like to get involved, please contact the Education & Equality Department.

Challenge Poverty Week Plan 2025 & Activities

Last year, for Challenge Poverty Week, the EIS refreshed our anti-poverty guidance for members, launching a new publication entitled ‘Stand Up to Child Poverty’ at a successful event in Glasgow, where we were joined by teachers, pupils, academic experts, and other guests.

This year, the EIS took part in the Child Poverty Action Group’s Youth Summit on 30th September. This powerful event was led by pupils who have grown up, or are currently growing up, in poverty in Scotland. They came together to share their experiences of tackling school costs, the barriers poverty places on learning, and to shape a youth manifesto on poverty in advance of the 2026 Scottish Parliament elections.

In addition to listening to the pupils, the EIS hosted a PACT/anti-poverty professional learning workshop for the teachers attending. We also hosted our own Challenge Poverty Week event on Thursday 2nd October, at EIS Headquarters in Edinburgh.

The event proved to be an inspiring, empowering, and interactive evening, featuring contributions from EIS PACTivists on their anti-poverty work in schools, opportunities to reflect on the challenges and barriers faced in supporting pupils and families experiencing poverty, and to highlight practical ways members and their schools/local associations can get involved in our anti-poverty work.