Access to and completion of a quality basic education is
widely accepted as a fundamental human right and a key way for citizens to gain
valued knowledge, including learning the skills and attitudes necessary to lead
an active, engaged and productive life. Over the past 25+ years, the global
community has sought to prioritize educational development as a key strategy
for national development and economic growth. The strength and scope of the
global Education for All movement, begun in 1990 at the First World Conference
on Education in Jomtien, Thailand and reaffirmed at the World Education Forum
in Dakar, Senegal in 2000 was phenomenal. The success of this movement and the
inclusion of education as a goal and indicator in the Millennium Development
Goals framework, and more recent Sustainable Development Goals agenda, attest
to the continued importance of education as a key driver of national and global
development and security.
However, given the importance of education for development,
it is deeply concerning that despite the progress achieved over the years in
terms of expanding enrollment, particularly at the primary/basic levels, so
many children and youth remain out of school around the world, the majority of
whom are girls. Moreover, beyond the challenge of ensuring that all children
have the opportunity to attend school is the matter of how schooling is
experienced differently by boys and girls and what this means for gender
equality in terms of retention, attainment, quality learning and educational outcomes.
The need to address gender-based inequalities that limit
girls’ schooling opportunities, experiences and outcomes is supported by
evidence demonstrating a wide range of valuable individual, social and economic
benefits associated with girls’ and women’s education. For example, for every
year of primary schooling she receives, a girl’s earning potential increases by
10 to 20%, and for every year of secondary education the increase is between 15
and 25%. As further quantified evidence of the extrinsic value of girls’
education, a child born to a literate mother is 50% more likely to survive past
the age of five, and educated mothers are more than twice as likely to send
their children to school (according to UNICEF). Beyond the extrinsic values
associated with girls’ education in terms of how much more an educated woman
can do for her family, community and country are the intrinsic values of
education as a human right and what it means to the individual person in terms
of their own human and personal development.
The purpose of this short piece is to provide a snapshot of
contemporary gender and education issues/trends and the policy options
available to governments and their partners that can support the elimination of
gender inequalities in schooling in the sub-Saharan and North African regions.
Despite differences in socioeconomic, cultural, religious and political
contexts, gender inequality in education is a recognized global phenomenon and
as such represents a shared challenge amongst nations of the world. Before
discussing contemporary gender (in) equality trends and challenges and the
available policy responses, I first offer a brief conceptual discussion of key
analytical and measurement terms.
Distinguishing
between “sex” and “gender” difference
To start with, the concept of gender is not synonymous with
“sex” or “girls” or “women”. When we speak of sex differences, we are referring
to the biological differences between males and females; when we speak of
gender differences, we are referring to the socially defined and enacted
differences between women and men in terms of characteristics, capabilities,
roles, etc. We learn our gender roles through socialization practices in our
families, communities and schools. Over the past 15 years or so there has been
a movement in the scholarly literature to better understand the nature and
significance of various masculinities or femininities in relation to
educational access, retention/attainment, learning and outcomes.
The concept of gender stereotype refers to attitudes and
beliefs about the characteristics associated with, and the activities
appropriate to, men or women in a given community or society. Gender bias
occurs when people make assumptions or stereotypes about behaviours, abilities
or preferences based on gender. For example, gender-based assumptions
concerning girls’ future roles as wives and mothers can shape what is learned
in school and to what level. Yet, despite the deeply entrenched and
taken-for-granted nature of gender, recognizing that gender roles and gender
identities are socially rooted and performed brings us to the powerful
conclusion that gender norms and values can and do change. The significance of
this realization cannot be over-stated as it suggests that we have the power to
address gender-based inequalities in schools and through schooling.
Distinguishing
between “gender parity” and “gender equality”
While the concepts of gender equality and gender equity are
often used interchangeably in international and national development frameworks
and policy, gender parity has dominated as a key indicator of progress towards
gender equality in education. A key theme in current scholarship and policy
advocacy concerns the limits of pursuing gender parity – or the achievement of
“equal participation of girls and boys in all forms of education based on their
proportion in the relevant age-groups in the population” – and instead suggests
the need to re-calibrate our compasses to focus more on gender equality and
equity and less on gender parity.
Gender equality, emphasizing sameness, refers to the
provision of equal conditions, treatment and opportunity for both men and women
to realize their full potential, whereas gender equity emphasizes difference
and refers to the process of being fair to men and women. What gender equity is
and how to achieve it involves value judgments, understanding of the different
experiences, positions and needs of different women and men in a society, and
the recognition that treating individuals or groups equitably sometimes means
treating them differently.
Gender (in) equality
in education: trends and challenges
Notwithstanding emergent concerns with issues of boys’
education, promoting girls’ education has been a global policy priority because
this has and continues to be the area where the need is greatest. The
sub-Saharan African region, despite showing a gender parity index (GPI)
increase from 0.85 to 0.92 between 1999 and 2012, remains the furthest from
achieving gender parity at this level. Close to three quarters of the countries
with fewer than 90 girls for every 100 boys enrolled in primary education were
in the sub-Saharan Africa region. The situation is worse at the secondary
level, with the average GPI only increasing from 0.82 to 0.84 between 1999-2012.
And again, almost three quarters of the countries considered to be far from
achieving gender parity at the secondary level are in the SSA region. Indeed,
worrying trends in terms of girls’ (and some boys’) transition to and
completion of secondary education is the main focus of gender equality in
education research and policy advocacy
The challenges to achieving gender equality in education
have been well documented over the past decades and continue to persist in the
contemporary moment. In terms of challenges related to demand-side factors, we
know that poverty, labour market structures/employment opportunities, gendered
socio-cultural expectations and practices (e.g., early marriage/pregnancy,
domestic work burdens) and security concerns continue to represent some of the
greatest barriers to girls’ (and some boys’) education. With respect to
supply-side factors of gender (in)equalities in education, we know that school
and classroom cultures, teachers, teaching and learning materials, the physical
condition of schools, and the overall policy landscape (e.g., presence of
equity policies, anti-sexual harassment policies, etc.), all shape the degree
to which gender equality and equity is enacted (or otherwise) in school
systems.
Linking school and
society, or supply- and demand-side barriers, gender-based violence (GBV) has
become an urgent policy concern over the past decade:
“Gender-based violence [GBV] may take a psychological,
physical and/or sexual form and relates to the enforcing or upholding of power
imbalances between the sexes… It [GBV] acts of sexual, physical or
psychological violence inflicted on children in and around schools because of
stereotypes and roles or norms attributed to or expected of them because of
their sex or gendered identity. It also refers to the differences between
girls’ and boys’ experience of and vulnerabilities to violence.
GBV manifests itself in a range of school setting and
interactions, including but not limited to teachers sexually harassing and/or
assaulting students, students harassing or assaulting other students, victim
blaming, early marriage/pregnancy, and punishing individuals for failing to
conform to gender role expectations. GBV has a high social and economic price
in terms of parents not wanting to send their children to school, in that it
often leads to dropping out of school, causes psychological trauma with
long-term and unpredictable consequences, in addition to pregnancy, disease and
injury.
Policy responses for
the promotion and achievement of gender equality in education
There are five main principles or patterns underpinning
successful gender equality in education approaches8. First, partnership
approaches that bring together governments, donors and civil society are key.
Second, is the need for enacting multiple and multi-sectoral interventions to
address the complex demand and supply-side challenges to girls’ education and
gender equality in education more broadly. Third, there is a need for strategic
and evidence-based policy advocacy and support for continued research,
monitoring and evaluation. Fourth, there must be commitment on the part of
governments and their partners to the promotion of gender equality in
education. Fifth, governments, with the support of donors and civil society,
must ensure adequate and sustainable education financing.
Research suggests that successful policies address change
and drive action in three main interconnected areas: interventions,
institutions and interactions. The following offers a brief discussion of
exemplars of policy responses associated with each of the preceding action
areas.
Interventions
The concept of “interventions” refers to specific policy
levers that can be used to promote access to education, addressing both demand-
and supply-side challenges to gender equality in schools. The building of more
schools and the recruitment of more teachers, including more women teachers to
act as positive role models, is one relatively straightforward way governments
can support educational access. Limiting the distance that children ‒ girls in
particular ‒ have to travel to get to school can go a long way to addressing
the security concerns of parents. Innovative interventions have included
pairing volunteers from the community with children to walk with them to and
from school to ensure their safety.
Reforms aimed at improving the quality of education are also
an important part of stimulating demand for schooling. Such reforms can include
the improvement of school facilities (e.g., ensuring access to clean water and
secure and separate toilet facilities) and the provision of adequate and
effective teaching and learning materials. Gender-responsive teacher training,
both in-service and pre-service, is also seen as an effective way to support
gender equitable teaching and learning in the long term, and as such represents
a valuable policy lever available to governments and an area for serious
investment.
An excellent resource for governments and an example of good
practice is the Forum for African Women Educationalists (FAWE)’s Gender
Responsive School model, “where the academic, social and physical environments
of the school and local community recognize the specific needs of both boys and
girls”. For example, the innovative model supports the “development of
gender‐responsive pedagogy, which focuses on lesson planning, language use,
classroom interactions, and the role of management in supporting
gender-responsive approaches in schools. It targets practical skills as well as
the training of school management teams.
Promoting the establishment of school-based clubs (e.g.,
school governance/student councils, girls’ and boys’ clubs, science clubs,
etc.) and other venues for participation and the development of self-esteem and
leadership skills is an effective component of inclusive and gender-responsive
learning environments. A further supply-side intervention to support gender
equality in education is curriculum reform and textbook revision to remove
gender bias and promote gender awareness.
To address constraints related to poverty and
marginalization ‒ two of the most serious challenges to gender equality in
education – several demand-side interventions have proven quite successful in
getting more girls (and marginalized boys) into school. First, the elimination
of school fees has been critically important. Second, many governments offer
financial subsidies to help off-set the direct and indirect costs of schooling
for the most vulnerable groups, particularly girls. Conditional cash transfer
(CCT) incentive schemes are a more recent policy innovation that have been used
with considerable success in a number of sectors, including education, to
change behaviour and promote gender equality in education. Additionally, the
documented success of school-based feeding programs and reproductive health
education (as well as other child-health supportive programming) support the
claim that multiple and multi-sectoral interventions are necessary to address
educational challenges related to poverty.
Institutions
Enacting and promoting gender equality in education involves
institutional reform and transformation. Gender mainstreaming and
gender-responsive budgeting represent two of the most important policy
approaches that governments have adopted to demonstrate their commitment to the
realization of gender equality in education and beyond. Institutional reform
also covers the need to develop strong monitoring, accountability and
enforcement mechanisms for successful policy implementation and development.
The collection of sufficient and appropriate data concerning
participation, gender relations, context, experience, learning and outcomes is
critical here, and a commitment to the collection and analysis of
sex-disaggregated data is of paramount importance for monitoring progress and
identifying challenges to the achievement of gender equality in education.
Effective enforcement mechanisms are also needed to ensure, among other things,
the implementation of gender equality policies, including anti-sexual
harassment policies and others aimed at combating gender-based violence in
schools.
Interactions
More recent research and advocacy has sought to highlight
the importance of engaging all stakeholders – government, school
administrators, teachers, parents and students – in gender equality in
education policy processes, a critical component of which is dialogue and
debate. Value differences associated with varying socio-economic, political and
cultural contexts are a reality and such differences need to be recognized and
engaged in order for societies to develop the policies that best reflect the
needs and aspirations of the communities they serve. Thus, reforming policy
processes to create genuine spaces for dialogue and debate represents a further
critical component of gender equality in education strategies. In addition to
the creation and support of Parent-Teacher Associations, School Management
Committees and the like, national and regional forums must be established where
actors can come together to take stock, assess challenges, identify assets and plan
accordingly for taking the necessary actions to achieve gender equality in and
through education.
Given that education is a human right and a cornerstone of
human and national socio-economic development, promoting gender equity in and
through education ought to remain a policy priority for governments, donors and
civil society in the 21st century. It is hoped that the trends, challenges and
strategies discussed above can help support and guide effective gender equity
policy and practice going forward. #SupportGirlChild
#GirlEducation #UniversalEducation #GenderEquality #GenderEquity
#EqualOpporturnities #EndGenderDiscrimination #SDG4 #SDG5
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