Education is necessary, while provisions of food, shelter, and healthcare are all necessary for alleviating poverty in the developing world, the most sustainable way to help a community improve its standard of life in the long run is to provide education for its residents. Educated people are more aware of health issues, they farm more effectively, and they can begin to help others around them.
Primary education is the key to develop a student's mind and abilities. To make him ready for higher education. To install some values in him. To develop his/her IQ. And many things. Higher education makes people ready to fight on a professional front. To work for the better future of oneself, economy, society. You have a destination to reach.
Education gets you a job. Education keeps your job, but a job feeds you. For some people education is their job. Even manual labor requires education. It might not be formal book work, but I guarantee you throw a random physicist it programmer into an unfinished house and tell them to finish it they wouldn't know where to begin. Education is essential, jobs are essential.