Michelle Obama, daughters heading to Liberia, Morocco, Spain

Michelle Obama plans to promote her year-old global girls’ education initiative during a late June trip to Liberia, Morocco and Spain.

She is traveling with daughters Malia, 18, who recently graduated high school, and Sasha, 15. Teachers died and schools were closed for months.

US first lady Michelle Obama and daughters Sasha and Malia will skip Kenya on their trip to Africa on Sunday as part of an effort to promote girls’ education.

The Obamas will then visit a Peace Corps-sponsored leadership camp for girls in the town of Kakata. The conversation will highlight both the educational barriers girls face as Liberia moves beyond the Ebola epidemic, and the U.S. Government’s efforts to continue to address those barriers and provide adolescent girls with equitable access to safe and quality education.

The First Lady’s visit will also highlight commitments made by the U.S. Government through the Millennium Challenge Corporation and USAID in partnership with the Kingdom of Morocco to help adolescent girls in Morocco go to school and stay in school. She will also visit Spain.

Pinto will moderate a discussion Monday between Obama and adolescent girls who have faced obstacles obtaining an education in Liberia and looking at the impact of the Ebola outbreak.

The school suspended mid-term exams scheduled to start Monday “to allow the students to give Mrs. Obama a rousing welcome to appreciate what the United States has done for us”, principal Harris Tarnue said.

First lady Michelle Obama sat down with four little girls and Cosmopolitan.com for some real talk in the White House Diplomatic Room (as you do).

In addition to her daughters, the first lady will also be joined at several stops by actresses and education advocates Meryl Streep and Frida Pinto.

In Liberia, almost two-thirds of Liberia’s school-age children do not attend class, and girls dropping out of school have sharply risen since the Ebola crisis, USA officials told reporters Friday. His trip will focus on security cooperation, deputy national security adviser Ben Rhodes told reporters Friday.