what education for the young child?; education today; vol...
TRANSCRIPT
Many people have asked me why, after founding two colleges andserving Vermont as a State Senator, Lieutenant Governor,and United States Congressman, I give up a comfortable job to
face the risks and challenges confronting UNESCO and the world. It’s simple.I wanted to join the global crusade for human opportunity through quality edu-cation and move it forward towards success.
The path to world peace is paved with education for all. Why? Because success ineducation is directly related to increased individual opportunity, economicstrength, and societal stability. And the journey towards a peaceful world begins byeducating the hundreds of millions of people who need literacy, job skills, and further learning.
Education has the power to transform people and countries alike, because it is thewellspring of equality, ability, social opportunity, economic stability and nationalprogress.
I have spent my career developing quality education programmes for the under-served. At UNESCO, I can join the global effort to build programmes at the countrylevel, enhancing human resources and sustainable development.
UNESCO’s Education Sector will become more effective by collaborating with othersand focusing on results at the local level. I look forward to working with NationalCommissions, Permanent Delegations, UN and other global agencies, and NGOs,to implement Education for All, the United Nations Literacy Decade and the Decadeof Education for Sustainable Development as our defining commitments.We will craft appropriate and effective policies, and quality programmes thatrespond to national needs. We will innovate to solve the problems facing us.Let effectiveness and quality, not tradition, be the standard we use.
As directed by UNESCO’s Executive Board and Director-General, I will develop a leadership framework and programme management model, which will emphasizedecentralization and results through collaboration and teamwork. And workingtogether, we will pave the path to a peaceful world with education for all.
I look forward to this work.
N0. 14July-September 2005
WHAT EDUCATION FOR THE YOUNG CHILD?
EDITO
INSIDE
Peter SmithAssistant Director-General for Education
EEDUC
ATIO
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FOR ALL
BBRIEFS
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FFOCUS
Education initiativesaround the world, p. 10
Education in prison, p. 2
Educating young children, p. 4
Artists campaign foreducation, p. 9
United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization
The Newsletterof UNESCO’s
Education Sector
Experts agree on the benefits of early childhood care and educationfor the 0 to 6 year-olds. But coverage remains low in many countriesand no clear consensus exists as to the appropriate pedagogy foreach age group. FOCUS, a four-page dossier, reports.
Prisoners’ educational level is low – usuallybelow the national average. In Canada,87 per cent of prisoners have completedhigh school, but in many countries themajority of inmates have not even finishedthe primary cycle. The proportion is 60 percent in Portugal, 50 per cent in Romania,and 75 per cent in Brazil’s State of SaoPaulo.
“While most countries claim that educationis available to all inmates, the reality is quitedifferent,” says Marc De Maeyer, researcherat UIE and co-author of the study. Out of apopulation of 10,500 inmates at Thihar Jailin New Delhi, hardly 500 are enrolled incourses. For the Guarulhus prison in Brazil,the figure is 350 out of 1,200, and in theUnited Kingdom only 30 per cent of inmatesare in learning activities.
The reasons are multiple, says De Maeyer.Insufficient funding, lack of teachers, secu-rity problems, over-population and inmates’own lack of interest. “This is understand-able,” says De Maeyer, “since prisoners’ mainpreoccupation is getting released.” Andwhen courses are provided, inmates tend todrop out early on. Women fare worse than
men. Learning activities directed to themare often limited to such activities as knit-ting and cookery, thus reinforcing stereo-types. This is the case in Malaysia, Brazil,Mexico and Benin.
The study’s message is that education for allis a right and restriction of one’s freedomdoes not suspend that right. The authors
call for more investment by govern-ments, international organizationsand NGOs so that prisons becomeplaces of continuous and informallearning rather than schools of crime.
What education in prison?Literacy is fundamental, and basiceducation and professional trainingare essential elements, according tothe study. “Education in prison,” saysHugo Rangel, researcher at the Inter-national Watch on Education in Prisonand co-author of the study, “must notbe conceived as mere skills for jobsbut as a path to personal empower-ment, enhanced citizenship and better health. Non-formal, innovativeapproaches must be used.“It is crucialto provide activities that can recon-cile prisoners with learning,” he adds.
The study also guards against privatecompanies subcontracting to prisoninmates. The risk is that this practice couldconstitute a partial privatization of theprison environment and jeopardize theright to good quality, lifelong learning.
Bancha has embarked on the path of lifelonglearning. He is banking on his certificate inarchitecture and a degree in law that hehopes to get before leaving prison nineyears from now to find his place in society.But what of the millions of inmates world-wide for whom prison is not a second chance?
Contact: Marc De Maeyer,UNESCO Institute for Education
E-mail: [email protected];www.educationinprison.org
Education TODAY No. 142
LEARNING WORLD
Bancha is 40 and has been in prison forsix years. His daily routine begins at8.30 a.m. in a class where he and
twenty other inmates at the Klong PremCentral Prison outside Bangkok are attend-ing a two-year architecture course. Usingtextbooks and computer graphics, the stu-dents learn the art of building, planning andinterior decorating.
Introduced in mid-May 2005, thearchitecture course is part of an edu-cation in prison programme being runfor more than fifty years in some 130prisons by Thailand’s CorrectionsDepartment. “Education promotesprisoners’ self-confidence, which willstand them in good stead when theyleave prison,” says Nathee Jitsawang,Director-General of the CorrectionsDepartment.
According to government statistics,over 37,000 Thai prisoners are nowenrolled at all levels of formal educa-tion, less than a quarter of all prison-ers. Roughly 4,000 inmates areattending undergraduate courses pro-vided by the state-run SukhothaiThammathirat Open University. A proj-ect, launched in 1997 by Thailand’sPrincess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn, pro-viding computer skills to inmates atBangkhen Central Women’s Prison in theeastern suburb of Bangkok is an example ofinnovative approaches. Already, 343 inmateshave graduated from the course.
Global trendsBut education in prison in not as buoyant inother Thai prisons or in other parts of theworld, according to a study based on datafrom some sixty countries to be released atthe International Conference on Educationin Prison organized by the UNESCO Institutefor Education (UIE), in Bucharest (22-25 Sep-tember). Many of the 10 million prisonersworldwide have dropped out of school, andin developing countries the large majorityhave never seen the inside of a classroom,the study reveals.
Liberation through educationPrisoners are among the most excluded from education, according to a UNESCO study
A second chance for an inmate in Thailand
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Education TODAY No. 14 3
read and discussed by the neo-literates, andtheir reactions taken into account. In thecase of this project – implemented by StateResource Centres in Indore, Delhi and Alwar– all concurred that speaking of decision-making skills in future books was crucial.Women needed to think critically and bestrong enough to deal with all thataffected their lives – whether that meantfrank exchanges with doctors, becomingthe sole bread-winners, or asserting theirproperty rights.
The thirteen new storybooks in Hindibrought out under the project are inter-active and enjoyable. The next phase willconsist of more training in how to producethis kind of material: simple at first glance;relevant at second.
Contact: Shankar Chowdhury,UNESCO New Delhi
E-mail: [email protected]
Here’s a story of a rural couple. Amigrant worker is returning to hisvillage from the city. In the train, he
fondly remembers the red bridal veil hiswife had given him as a ‘keepsake’ before hisdeparture. She had entreated him to honourit. The symbolism of this emotionallycharged plea is not lost on the neo-literatereader: the bridal veil is a married woman’smost prized possession, and red is an auspi-cious colour in India. Together, they aretokens of happiness and holy matrimony.
In another story – one which mirrors thereality of tourism in Rajasthan in India – ayoung hotel owner in the state’s desertregion provides his guests with all kinds ofshady services. Inevitably, his quest foreasy money ends in disaster. He becomesHIV positive.
A reader-friendly primerIt is these simple and direct stories that areproving to be effective vehicles for HIV/AIDSmessages for neo-literates. They arestraightforward, easily readable andlearner-friendly. But crafting such stories isless simple than it appears as a UNESCO-UNAIDS-Government of India project dis-covered when it set about designingresource material. “It was when we realizedhow out-dated and dreary the existingHIV/AIDS material was that we launched thisprogramme,” says Shankar Chowdhury ofUNESCO New Delhi.
In a bid to make primers meaningful, volun-teers quizzed learners on the sort ofthemes and illustrations they would behappy with. A number of ideas were thrownin. The story of the bridal veil was a hugesuccess. The women found it ‘realistic’,‘touching’ and ‘positive’. They liked the man’scommitment to his wife; it was a ‘good storyof mutual trust’ between husband and wife.This trust was probably the best way toavoid infection.
When the storylines proved too difficult, thewomen spoke out. They disagreed with sto-ries, which, they felt, stepped out of cus-
Little tales with a gentle twistA UNESCO-UNAIDS project is designing HIV/AIDS material for neo-literates in India
tomary practices. Somefelt that a wife couldhardly ask her husband –as some stories showedher doing – if he had hadsex with another woman.Not all, however, were ofthis view. There werethose who argued that awife had no choice but toask her husband thisquestion if he had livedaway from home. But ithad to be done with tactand politeness. On onepoint, however, there wasunanimity: the young wifein the story ‘Kammo’had become aware ofHIV/AIDS through literacyprogrammes.
It was then, the turn of the writers and illus-trators. They had to be persuaded to aban-don some of their myths about HIV/AIDS.The veteran writers learnt of women’s vul-nerability, of the need for them to consultdoctors without fear or shame; they discov-ered that people knew of sexually transmit-ted infections but not of HIV/AIDS; that themessages they would deliver through theirstories had to merge into the larger issuesof unemployment, development, povertyand ignorance. Above all, these messagesand their manner of delivery had to be intune with the people’s value system.
Writers and illustrators also re-learned afew basics of their craft: short, sharp sen-tences and simple spellings. They realizedthat the stories would have to reflect peo-ple’s daily lives; and that primers had to beamply illustrated.
Training volunteersAfter designing the reader-friendly primerthe next step is to know how to use it.To begin with, you need a set of trained vol-unteers well-versed in local conditions,capable of handling sensitive queries andproviding feedback. The books must then be
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HIV/AIDS messages have to be simple and relevant
Education TODAY No. 144
FOCUS
Countries, North and South, are seeking to expand early childhood care and education in line withWhile there would appear to be general agreement about the benefits of early childhood provision,among specialists as to the appropriate pedagogy for each age group.
What education for the
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hood care and education as one of the Edu-cation for All goals, state provision in devel-oping countries is still extremely low, withearly childhood care still often the preserveof parents, the extended family and privateorganizations.
Little state involvement
According to the 2005 EFA Global Monitor-ing Report, in India, gross enrolment in allkinds of early childhood services is 30 percent, and is virtually non-existent in muchof sub-Saharan Africa, such as Burundi(1.3 per cent), Mali (1.6 per cent) or Senegal(3.3 per cent). The average for sub-SaharanAfrica is just 5.8 per cent.
Education TODAY No. 14 5
Arecent early childhood review mis-sion to Kenya remarked that poor,illiterate mothers in Kenya’sMachakos District were vehe-
mently opposed to sending their children toan early childhood development centre if itdid not teach them how to read and write.Indeed, some parents find it hard to acceptthat what they perceive as ‘play’ is a form ofeducation. One result is that early childhooddevelopment centres are being turned defacto into early primary education facili-ties, with 3-year-olds arrayed in rows ofchairs and desks, facing the teacher stand-ing at a blackboard.
Parents’ misunderstanding of what is atstake is symptomatic of a certain confusionthat prevails about what early childhoodcare and development actually is. Whilethere is general agreement that learningbegins at birth, there is a divergence ofviews among professionals concerning two concepts: ‘early childhood care anddevelopment’ and ‘early childhood edu-cation’. In a nutshell, care vs. education.“The ultimate purpose of early childhoodservices is to promote the holistic develop-ment of the child: his or her emotions,personality, and cognitive skills,” says Soo-Hyang Choi, Chief of UNESCO’s Section forEarly Childhood and Inclusive Education.“It should not be considered as an extensionof primary education.”
It is significant, therefore, that the Consul-tative Group on Early Childhood Care andDevelopment, a consortium of agencies,donors, NGOs and foundations that work inthis field, recently set up a working group toaddress the early childhood componentwithin the Education for All framework.
Indeed, five years after the internationalcommunity set the expansion of early child-
the Education for All agenda.a divergence of views prevails
young child?
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UNESCO and early childhoodUNESCO’s work in early childhood careand education focuses on policy issues.In a joint project with the Organisationfor Economic Co-operation andDevelopment (OECD), UNESCO is currentlycarrying out policy reviews in Brazil,Indonesia, Kazakhstan and Kenya. Thecomprehensive reports that emanatefrom these reviews address specificissues relating to access, quality, fundingand coordination in early childhoodeducation.
UNESCO’s Policy Briefs on EarlyChildhood, published monthly in English,French and Spanish, feature debates andreform experiences in developing anddeveloped countries. They aredistributed via e-mail and online.
Website:www.unesco.org/education/ecf/briefsE-mail: [email protected]
publicly-funded kindergarten provision byschool districts from the age of 4.
Reaping the benefits
International agencies and NGOs are tryingto persuade governments that it may befalse economy not to invest in early child-hood services. In a recent document pub-lished by the Consultative Group, CarolineArnold points out that ECCE is first of all aright, under the Convention on the Rights ofthe Child. She also cites evidence that it is a“frontline strategy for achieving povertyreduction goals”, while also being a “signifi-cant entry point within, and foundation for,diverse broad educational, social and healthachievements.”
Similarly, a World Bank/Consultative Grouppublication by Judith Evans and RobertMyers, Childhood Counts, claims that“neglecting children in their first yearsdecreases the likelihood that they will growto be healthy, productive citizens, and hasbeen demonstrated to have economic andsocial implications for the society as a whole.
The benefits to society of early childhoodcare and development programmes are:lower child morbidity, higher enrolment,lower repetition, fewer dropouts, improvedschool performance … and lower crime.
Studies in Turkey and in Latin America showthat the benefits of early childhood edu-cation are much greater among poor chil-dren. And reports from certain East Africancountries and Nepal reveal that childrenwho have attended pre-school – 3-6 year-olds – go to primary school more preparedand better ready to learn. Indeed, the argu-ment that pre-school is a useful preparationfor primary school is easier to demonstratethan more nebulous concepts, such as ‘cognitive development’ that may be hard tomeasure.
A response to needs
For Helen Penn, Professor of Early Childhoodat the University of East London (UK), one ofthe obstacles to the successful implementa-tion of ECCE in the South is that the modelsand the economic arguments were devel-
getting the primary education part there,and the challenge is that they sometimessee early childhood development as a lux-ury.” Understandably, therefore, ECCE foryoung infants, especially for the under-3s,is still mainly private, often set up in responseto local needs and funded by NGOs, such asSave the Children, Bernard van Leer Founda-tion, Aga Khan Foundation, etc., and UNICEF.But the picture varies enormously fromcountry to country. In India, for example,95 per cent of expenditure on pre-primaryeducation comes from public funds, while thefigure is just 5 per cent in Indonesia.
As for the industrialized countries, stateprovision of early childhood care and educa-tion is gradually becoming more wide-spread, albeit with significant variations inaccess and quality, especially for the poor. Inthe United States, for example, 90 per centof provision for under-3s is from the privatesector (60 per cent non-profit and 30 percent for profit), giving way gradually to
There are exceptions, such as Cuba, where,according to Robert Myers, founding direc-tor of the Consultative Group for EarlyChildhood Care and Development, “anextraordinary effort has been made to pro-vide all children under 6 with some kind ofeducation and development programme”.
But in many developing countries earlychildhood care and education (ECCE) is notpart of government policy. “It may figure innational plans, but the funding strategiesoften remain dependent on the private sector and civil society support,” says AnnTherese N’dong Jatta, Director of UNESCO’sBasic Education Division.
Clearly, part of the problem is competitionfor a share of the budget in cash-strappedeconomies. “In Africa and Asia,” says KathyBartlett, of the Aga Khan Foundation andCo-Director of the Consultative Group forEarly Childhood Care and Development,“governments are having a hard time just
Education TODAY No. 146
What education for the young child?
Responding to inner-city bluesIn the United States, the Head Start programme, which has been running for40 years and funded by federal government at a cost of some $6.8 billion (for2005), targets low-income families, with the goal of increasing school readiness ofyoung children (0-5 years). While the programme claims to be successful, recentOECD figures suggest that many low-income families are still falling through thenet. Only 45 per cent of children from 3 - 5 years from low-income families areenrolled in pre-school, compared to 75 per cent among high-income families.
Meanwhile, the United Kingdom has also introduced its own Sure Start programmeto provide greater choice for parents in how they balance their work commitmentsand family life through easy access to children’s centres. This currently includes 12.5 weeks of free child care for 33 weeks a year for all 3- and 4-year-olds who needit, aiming to increase this next year.
Cathy Urwin, an infant psychotherapist working in a deprived area of London,explains that “in terms of language development, physical health, dental health and behavioural problems, children in impoverished areas are much worse off thanthe rest of the population. There is evidence that, in some areas, the Sure Startcentres have already made quite a lot of difference.”
From the outset, Sure Start has involved parents in planning, at every step. Butthere are huge differences between areas. “In the Tower Hamlets district where I work, there is a large Vietnamese and Chinese population, and that group is verydifferent to work with compared to a Bangladeshi group, for example,” says, Urwin.“You have to find ways of working with the communities.” Sure Start is nowcreating children’s centres where resources such as a speech therapist and apsychologist are brought together around nursery schools.
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birth to 3, which is seen as the responsibilityof parents and largely in the domain of thesocial and health sectors, and the periodfrom 3 to 6, more likely to fall within therealm of education. Because the EducationMinistry (the ‘lead’ ministry where EFA isconcerned) is less familiar with early child-hood services to younger children, it has atendency to copy the primary school modeland, in the name of ECCE, provide ‘earlyschooling’. “This is a problem,” says Soo-Hyang Choi. “Early schooling is not earlychildhood care and education.”
The steady migration in developing coun-tries from rural areas to towns and citiesbrings its own challenges for young children,as an increasing number of woman work inthe formal sector. UNDP estimates that by2015, some 42.8 per cent of the populationof sub-Saharan Africa will live in towns andcities, compared to 21 per cent in 1975.“A rise in urban population is closely associ-ated with a rise in double income house-holds,” says a 2003 UNESCO report on earlychildhood care and education in E-9 coun-tries, “with less access to childcare supportfrom family members.”
Redefining responsibilities
For many developing nations providing earlychildhood services for the full zero to6 spectrum is therefore a daunting chal-lenge. Although governments worldwide arebound by the EFA agenda to provide someform of early childhood provision, there haslong been a split between the period from
oped in the North, and do not travel well.The claims for financial savings “are, in gen-eral, hugely optimistic and have limitedapplication in many developing countries,”she says.
Meanwhile, the emphasis on the benefits ofECCE for the child is fairly recent. In manydeveloped countries and the former SovietUnion, most of the well-established, state-run systems of care and education in earlychildhood came about as a response towomen’s need (or, more recently, desire) tofind paid work outside the home.
In France, where some 70 per cent of womenare in paid employment, nearly all childrenfrom 3 – 6 years of age attend a state-runécole maternelle, while subsidies of one formor another are available for childcare forthe under-3s that includes activities aimedat stimulating and integrating the childsocially. And, since educational reforms inSweden in 2001 and 2002, all children from1 to 5 years now have the right to nurseryschool, no matter how much the parentsearn, or whether they work.
Increasing urbanization
In the developing countries, where mothersusually work in the informal sector – in thefields or selling at the market – the demandfor early childhood services is not arti-culated. Mothers are presumed to be athome which means that governments arenot forced to act. More broadly, in ruralareas of much of Asia and Africa childrenmay be co-opted by parents from a youngage to carry out household chores, leavinglittle time for play or pre-school. But thereare exceptions.
In Bangladesh, for example, a local NGO,Phulki (‘spark’ in Bengali) persuaded gar-ment factories – which mainly employwomen – to set up factory-based crèchefacilities for children between 6 weeks ofage and 2 years. These give breast-feedingmothers access to their infants duringworking hours, so they no longer have togive up essential income to look after theirbabies at home. Initially funded by Phulki,the crèche is now managed jointly by theemployer and employees.
Education TODAY No. 14 7
Cultural identity for toddlersUntil 1995, education in Papua New Guinea, an island nation in the South Pacific,was in English. As the world’s most linguistically diverse nation, with 823 livinglanguages spoken by a population of 5.2 million, there may have been some logisticvalue in this, but it did little to foster a sense of national and cultural identity.In 1979, parents in Bougainville Island, in North Solomons Province put forward the idea of providing their children with two years of pre-school education in theirown language, before the first grade of primary school, which would be in English.The Viles Tok Ples Skul (village language school) was born, later becoming the TokPles Pri Skul (vernacular language pre-school).
During the 1980s three other provincial governments and four other languagecommunities followed suit. Vernacular language pre-schools sprung up elsewhereover the next decade, but remained informal, with no national curriculum, and with teaching materials prepared by NGOs. The education reforms of 1995 finallyled to the development of a national curriculum, encouraging vernacular languageteaching in the two years before primary school, with a gradual introduction ofEnglish after that. By fifth grade, teaching is 30 per cent in the local language,70 per cent in English. At the end of 2000, vernacular language pre-schools wereteaching in 380 language groups.
A similar initiative is just beginning in Vanuatu, also in Melanesia, which has some 106 local languages for a population of just 200,000. And, in New Zealand,Te köhanga reo (‘language nest’) is a total immersion programme for Maori childrenfrom birth to age 6, where they speak Maori and learn within an indigenouscultural context. The programme started in 1982.
From UNESCO Policy Briefs on Early Childhood, October 2002
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Education TODAY No. 148
EDUCATION FOR ALL
School fees abolishedA UNESCO study assesses Kenya’s bold decision to provide free primary schooling
pupil ratio is 1:50), which mean that pupilsreceive fewer assignments because teachershave no time to mark them.
The assessment provides a range of sugges-tions aimed at galvanizing support for freeprimary school. It should be implementedwithin a broader education for allframework, including vocational training,adult literacy and non-formal solutions.Government should revise criteria forfunding and give more to hardship schools.
A glaring omission is consultation withparents and communities. “There is a generalmisconception about the meaning of ‘free’education, with parents taking the view thatthey have no role and therefore are nolonger required to participate in schoolactivities,” comments Obondoh. “This poses agreat challenge to the notion of communityparticipation in school governance.”
If Kenya were to start again, howshould it go about implementing
free primary education?The Government should develop anappropriate policy, giving direction on access,quality, transition for one class to another and drop-out. This policy should also compriseguidelines on admission criteria, access forchildren with special needs, and clarify theroles of the government, the developmentpartners and other key stakeholders. It shouldthen budget for free schooling and reorganizethe Education Ministry to accommodate thenew initiative.
What are the main challenges today?Early childhood education should be
made part of free primary education and all early childhood development centresshould be monitored for quality. Because ofovercrowding, additional classrooms should be built. The variation in the teacher-pupil
ratio should be addressed and more learning materials and textbooks provided. Teachers should receive in-service training to learn child-centredteaching methods and new positive discipline techniques as well as guidance and counselling. To ensure transparency and accountability, budget tracking should be introduced and involve school management committees composed of parents and the community.
Are you satisfied with the supportthe international community is
giving your country in this initiative?The international community could do more;it could cancel the debt. The G-8 countriescould give grants to Kenya to enable it to have a sound education system, since freeprimary education is bound to contributesignificantly to reducing poverty and helping the country reach the EFA goals.
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questions to Rose OdoyoChairperson of Elimu Yetu Coalition, a Kenyan NGO3
Desperately needed too is an explicit road-map that everyone can follow. “UNESCOhas made a strong pitch for the Ministry ofEducation to come up with an interactivecommunication strategy to allow teachers,parents, pupils, schools committees andother interested parties to give their views,”adds Nkinyangi.
In response, the government is currentlyinvolved in a national consultative forumwith civil society, UN agencies and donors to develop a 10-year Kenya Education SectorInvestment Support Programme, withemphasis on sustaining free primaryschooling. “This provides some very goodfuture prospects,” says Obondoh.
Contact: Susan Nkinyangi, UNESCO NairobiE-mail: [email protected]
When Kenya’s government abolishedprimary school fees in January 2003,eager parents stampeded to enroll
their children in school. “My daughterdeserves the best,” said George Odhiambo,an unemployed father from Nairobi. “I alwaysknew this. Only before I could not afford todo anything about it.”
The number of children in public primaryschools rose from 5.9 million in 2002 to 7.2 million today. Launching free primaryeducation “was the best policy decision everin the history of post-independence Kenya”,says Andiwo Obondoh of the Africa NetworkCampaign on Education for All (ANCEFA).
Similarly, a recent UNESCO assessment,undertaken in collaboration with Kenya’sMinistry of Education, Science andTechnology, Challenges of Implementing Free Primary Education in Kenya, calls thedecision “a major milestone.” The programme“has literally opened the doors to school for children living in poverty and previouslydenied the opportunity to learn. People were truly overjoyed and relieved,” explainsSusan Nkinyangi, Senior Education Adviser in UNESCO Nairobi.
Diverse difficulties
One of the key achievements, the assessmentfound, is the provision of learning materialsand textbooks, thus improving the quality ofeducation. Children now receive geometricalsets, items they had never known in the past,but which are critical for good performancein mathematics.
Yet despite its popularity, putting the policyinto effect has proven to be no easy task.“Lack of planning has led to crowdedclassrooms with too many children sharingfew and inadequate facilities,” the reviewpoints out. It was carried out with theparticipation of teachers, students andparents in 162 schools in five of Kenya’s eightprovinces.
Besides over-stretched resources thatthreaten the quality of education, difficultiesinclude teacher shortages (average teacher
Much more on
The current attention in development circleson poverty reduction is being echoed in theagenda of the upcoming meeting of the EFAWorking Group (19-21 July). Since literacy playsa major role in lifting people out of poverty,it will be a particular focus of the meeting.“Literacy is the bedrock of development,” saysAbhimanyu Singh, Director of the Division ofInternational coordination and Monitoring forEducation for all. “Yet it is the neglectedelement of EFA”. A side-event will focus onLIFE, a literacy programme to be launchedshortly by UNESCO in thirty-six countrieswhere illiteracy is the most severe.
Some 70 per cent of the poor live in ruralzones, yet education of rural people is anotherneglected area. New innovative strategies areneeded to reach these groups with viablelearning opportunities, whether these are in formal schools or in alternative ways. TheWorking Group is expected to come up with
consensus on the future shape of education inrural contexts and its financial implications.
The debate on funding will focus on newpledges of aid to education and explore waysof mobilizing resources for all six EFA goals,including literacy, as the Fast Track Initiativeis limited to primary school completion.
Finally, the Working Group will discuss whodoes what in EFA, examining the overlaps andthe gaps with the aim of reaching a sharperdelineation of roles.
The meeting will be informed by recentreports such as the U.N. Millennium ProjectReport, the Paris Declaration on aideffectiveness, the U.K. Commission for Africaand the U.N. Secretary-General’s report onfollow-up to the Millennium Declaration.
Contact: Abhimanyu Singh, UNESCO ParisE-mail: [email protected]
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Working Group to focuson poverty reduction
World tourY Some 200 participants came together at the Tenth Commonwealth of IndependentStates’ Ministers Conference, in Minsk,Belarus,(5-6 April). They included EducationMinisters from Azerbaijan, Belarus,Kazakhstan, Kyrgystan, Moldova, RussianFederation, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Ukraine.They discussed Education for All andEducation for Sustainable Development.
Y National EFA coordinators from Algeria,the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya, Mauritania,Morocco and Tunisia discussed the issue ofquality education at a regional seminar inTunisia (5-7 April). The seminar looked at howthe EFA goals have been taken into consider-ation in these countries’ national plans.
Y The Second Conference of Ministers ofEducation of the African Union took place inAlger (8-11 April). It was attended by thirty-eight African Education Ministers and is afirst step towards the preparation of the 6th Summit of the African Union in Sudan in January 2006.
Y Journalists and media professionals fromthe Arab region attended a 5-day trainingworkshop in Doha (18-22 April) on writing andreporting on EFA. Its aim: to give participantsa better understanding of EFA and to sensitizethem to such issues as educating girls andwomen, the disadvantaged and those withspecial needs. The training was organized by UNESCO and Al Jazeera.
Y A regional meeting of National andRegional EFA Coordinators and NGO RegionalCoordinators was held at Ain Al Soknha, Egypt(13-16 May) in the framework of theConsultative Consultation of NGOs. Organizedby UNESCO Beirut, the meeting discussedregional priorities, capacity building andimproving communications betweengovernments and NGOs.
Y The inter-agency Thematic Working Groupon EFA for East and South East Asia took placeon 3 June in Bangkok. Attended by specialistsfrom ILO, FAO, UNESCAP, UNESCO, UNICEF andother concerned agencies, the meetingfocused on EFA flagship programmes in theregion and EFA in Thailand.
Y Education planners from twenty-fivecountries gathered at UNESCO (6-10 June) toexchange experiences in policy formulationand in costing the EFA goals within sector-wide frameworks, and to discuss how UNESCOcan respond to their needs in these areas.
The Send my Friend to School campaign that marked EFA Week 2005 (24-30 April)was a resounding success. At least 3.5 millioncut-out ‘friends’ were made. Heads of State,Education Ministers and parliamentariansparticipated in numerous events throughoutthe week and signed pledges to take a specific action in 2005.
And the mobilization continues. The GlobalCampaign for Education is now planning to send 1 million cut-out ‘friends’ to the G-8 Summit in the U.K. in July, asking worldleaders to “make poverty history”.
At UNESCO’s invitation, twenty-five artistsfrom diverse origins joined the campaign,making ‘friends’ on wood and decorating them. Exhibited at UNESCO in Paris, from 25 April to 19 May, their works of art will travel to education events worldwide in the coming months.
Contact: Teresa Murtagh, UNESCO ParisE-mail: [email protected]
www.unesco.org/education/efa
Artists campaign for education
Education TODAY No. 1410
BRIEFS
says, because they leave these countriesbelow the decisive threshold from whicheconomic and social benefits are attained.
Education progress in Africa has been steadybut slow. In 1990, almost a quarter of Africanchildren did not even have access to the firstyear of primary school. In 2002/03 less than10 per cent were excluded. But whereprimary school completion is concerned, thefigures progressed by only 10 percentagepoints. In the same period, only four out often African children completed the primarycycle. And these averages mask disparities ingender, urban vs. rural areas and wealthiestvs. poorest countries.
The report offers an analysis of the impact of education on Africa’s economic and socialdevelopment, outlines advances since 2000and options and priorities to accelerateprogress towards the 2015 goals. “It providesus with insight into how to rework policiesand direct energy at national and inter-national levels,” says Lalla Aïcha Ben Barka,Director, UNESCO Dakar.
Download the report www.polededakar.org and www.dakar.unesco.org
Computer literacyfor secondarystudentsSome 200 Grade 10 and 12 learners in Namibiaparticipated in a three-day computer literacycourse from 13 to 15 June as part of a pilot project funded by UNESCO to improve distanceeducation in secondary schools. It was thefirst of two training sessions targeting each100 learners in various provinces, withtwenty learners per site. Another 100 morewill be trained similarly later this year.
Conducted with the Namibian College ofOpen Learning (NAMCOL) these first-timeusers learned basic computer skills, includinghow to use a word processor, electronic mailand the Internet. Following the training, thelearners were provided with a CD-ROM onPhysical Science developed by NAMCOL tostimulate learners’ independent and criticalthinking.
“Nowadays, without training in computers,you’re not going anywhere,” said one learner
Counting out-of-school children
BenchmarkingEFA in AfricaCurrently a strong concentration of educationbudgets in Africa benefits the wealthiestsegments of society. This is one of thefindings of a new report Education for All:Paving the Way for Action by the Pôle deDakar team, at UNESCO’s regional office inDakar. Education is a condition for economictake-off provided a ‘critical threshold’ of sixyears of schooling is reached. This threshold,the report says, justifies public spending on the primary level. And since primary educationcombats poverty and has a positive impacton behavioural change, childcare and thefight against HIV/AIDS, it plays a direct rolein achieving the other DevelopmentMillennium Goals, the report argues.
At current trends, thirteen African countrieshave or should have attained universalprimary education by 2015; thirty-one willnot meet the target and twenty-five of thesewill not reach the 75 per cent completionrate. These results are worrying, the report
Globally, there were 115 million children outof school in 2001/02, according to a newreport Children Out of School: MeasuringExclusion from Primary Education by theUNESCO Institute for Statistics (UIS) andUNICEF. Some 53 per cent of these out-of-school children were girls – 61.6 million.
“The methodology used in this report is animprovement over previous efforts,” saysMichael Bruneforth of the UIS. “It is anattempt to produce a single source forglobal and regional estimates.” PreviouslyUNESCO and UNICEF produced figuresbased on different approaches. Theadvantage of this methodology, heexplains, is that it does not calculate as‘out of school’ primary school-age childrenwho are currently in secondary school andit confronts enrolment figures with thosebased on survey data, such as UNICEF’smultiple indicator cluster surveys (MICS)and USAID-funded Demographic and HealthSurveys (DHS). Next steps are to create new
estimates from which to assess progressfrom the baseline figure of 115 million.
The report also explores the character-istics of these out-of-school children.Using survey data from eighty countries,it presents compelling evidence ofdisparities in enrolment due to householdwealth, place of residence and sex. Forinstance, more than three times as manychildren from the poorest households (38 per cent) were out of school comparedto those from the richest households (12 per cent).
Finally, the report stresses specific policiesto boost participation among differentgroups of out-of-school children: those whohave never been to school, those who enterlate and those who leave before completion.
Contact: Michael Bruneforth,UNESCO Institute for Statistics
E-mail: [email protected]
Download the report at www.uis.unesco.org
Education TODAY No. 14 11
AGENDA
JULY 15-16-18Global Advisory Committee Meeting of the UN Girls’ Education Initiative(UNGEI) • Organized by UNESCO and UNGEI Secretariat • Paris, FranceContact: Florence Migeon, UNESCO Paris • E-mail: [email protected]
18 and 21Coordination Group of the Collective Consultation of NGOs on EFA•Paris, FranceContact: Sabine Detzel, UNESCO Paris • E-mail: [email protected]
18-21Fast Track Initiative Meetings • Paris, France Contacts: Khawla Shaheen and Hilaire M’putu, UNESCO Paris E-mails: [email protected] and [email protected]
19-216th Meeting of the Working Group on Education for All • Paris, FranceContact: Abhimanyu Singh, UNESCO Paris • E-mail: [email protected]
21-22LIFE Partnership Meeting • UNESCO ParisContact: Shigeru Aoyagi, UNESCO Paris • E-mail: [email protected]
AUGUST 1-3Experts Meeting on Technical and Vocational Education and Training Joint Projects in the Arab States • Organized by UNESCO Beirut and UNESCO-UNEVOC • Amman, Jordan • Contacts: Sulieman Sulieman,UNESCO Beirut and Rupert Maclean, UNESCO-UNEVOCE-mails: [email protected] and [email protected]
10-13Sub-regional Seminar on UNEVOC Networking and Improvement of Technical and Vocational Education and Training and Orienting it for Sustainable Development • Organized by UNESCO-UNEVOC Bangkok, Thailand • Contact: Rupert Maclean, UNESCO-UNEVOC E-mail: [email protected]
SEPTEMBER 8International Literacy Day
9-10Vocational Content in Mass Higher Education: Responses to the Challenges of the Labour Market • Organized by UNESCO-UNEVOC,UNESCO European Centres for Higher Education (CEPES) and the ResearchCentre for Skills, Knowledge and Organizational Performance (SKOPE)University of Oxford • Bonn, GermanyContacts: Astrid Hollander, UNESCO-UNEVOC and Peter Wells UNESCO CEPESE-mails: [email protected] and [email protected]
10-11Academic Freedom Conference: Problems and Challenges in Arab andAfrican Countries • Organized by UNESCO and the Arab and African Research Center (AARC), the Council for the Development of Social ScienceResearch in Africa (CODESRIA) and the Swedish Institute • Alexandria, EgyptContact: Lamya El Amrani, UNESCO Paris • E-mail: [email protected]
11-145th International Conference on the Capability Approach “Knowledgeand Public Action” • Organized by UNESCO and the Human Development andCapability Association, the Institut de Recherche pour le Développement,and the Centre d’Economie et d’Ethique pour l’Environnement et leDéveloppement • Contact: Kaori Adachi, UNESCO ParisE-mail: [email protected]
12-13Third Scientific Committee Meeting for the Arab StatesOrganized by the UNESCO Forum on Higher Education, Research andKnowledge • Alexandria, Egypt • Contact: Lamya El Amrani, UNESCO ParisE-mail: [email protected]
after the course. “We have some difficultsubjects such as Physical Science, but nowthe CD-ROM will help us.”
The project aims to make use of e-basededucation material and to enhancestudents’ learning experience, goingbeyond a mere understanding of scientificfacts.
Contacts: Harumi Toyama and Kaleni Hiyalwa,UNESCO Windhoek
E-mails: [email protected] [email protected]
UNESCO clubs and educationA survey launched in hutment clusters inthirty-five States of India revealed thereasons why children in these areas arenot in school: parents see education asirrelevant; extreme poverty is a barrier,particularly for girls; children do not haveproper shoes and the school is too farfrom home. For some, the equation wassimple: the 25-50 rupees a child can fetchcleaning a windscreen outweighs the long-term benefits of education.
To find out more about education in the shantytowns, UNESCO New Delhi andthe Confederation of UNESCO Clubs andAssociations of India joined forces for the survey. They sent 4,000 questionnairesto UNESCO Clubs, NGOs and schools.
Requested to comment on the ongoingliteracy programmes, the survey foundthat the NGOs and social workers were notgetting the cooperation and financial helpthey needed from government and that nofacility was in place to allow learners tointegrate regular schools after training.
The findings of this survey were discussedby seventy-nine UNESCO Club leaders fromtwenty-three states during a trainingprogramme in New Delhi from 25 to28 April.
Contact: Akemi Yonemura, UNESCO New DelhiE-mail: [email protected]
BOOKSHELF
Education Today is a quarterly newsletter on trends and innovations in education, on worldwide efforts towards Education for All and on UNESCO’s own education activities. It is published by UNESCO’s Education Sector in Arabic,Chinese, English, French, Portuguese, Spanish and Russian. All articles are free of copyright restrictions and can bereproduced provided Education Today is credited.Editors: Anne Müller and Teresa MurtaghContributors: Songpol Kaopatumtip, p. 2; Latika Padgaonkar, p. 3; Peter Coles pp. 4-7; Cathy Nolan, p. 8Assistant: Martine Kayser • Design: Pilote Corporate • Layout: Sylvaine BaeyensPhoto credits (cover): Berthold Egner; UNESCO/ASPnet/Karin Hunziker; UNESCO/Brendan O’Malley;UNESCO/Georges Malempré; UNESCO/Spier-Donati • ISSN 1814-3970
Education Today, Executive Office, Education Sector, UNESCO • 7, place de Fontenoy • 75352 Paris 07 SP • France Tel: 33 1 45 68 21 27 • Fax: 33 1 45 68 56 26/27 • E-mail: [email protected] news on: www.unesco.org/education
United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization
Adult Learning and Poverty Reduction by Madhu Singh and FrankYoungman. This booklet looks at international, regional and nationalcase studies, which reveal how poverty reduction through adulteducation can be an enabling process. Price 10.00¤. Available fromUNESCO Institute for Education. E-mail: [email protected]
All Equal in Diversity is the name of a new international campaignlaunched by UNESCO’s Associated Schools within the framework ofthe Transatlantic Slave Trade Education Project to mobilize schoolsagainst racism, discrimination and exclusion. The campaign kitcontains guidelines, an evaluation form, stickers and a poster.Online: www.aspnet.unesco.org and on CD-ROM.
Reading and Writing Poetry: theRecommendations of Noted Poets from ManyLands on the Teaching of Poetry in SecondarySchools. This booklet brings to methods ofteaching poetry two important dimensions: thecreative perspectives of fifty poets from twenty-five countries and the perspectives of differentcultures regarding reading and writing poetry.Available in English, French and Spanish. E-mail:[email protected] and online http://unesdoc.unesco.org/images/0013/001395/139551e.pdf
Monitoring Educational Achievement by T. N. Postlethwaite.This book explains what monitoring educational achievement means,with concrete examples from national and international case studies.It also provides answers to questions regarding educationalachievements, standards, costs and surveys. Fundamentals ofEducational Planning series, 81, Available from UNESCO Publishing,Price: 12,20¤; http://upo.unesco.org
Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) forCommunity Empowerment through Non-formal Education:experiences from Lao PDR, Sri Lanka, Thailand and Uzbekistan.This report presents country experiences and key findings, as well aslessons learned from the UNESCO’s ICT-Non-formal project launchedby UNESCO’s Asia-Pacific Programme of Education for All (APPEAL).Published by UNESCO Bangkok. E-mail: [email protected]
UNITWIN/UNESCO Chairs Programme Ten Years of Action:Case Studies. This booklet presents the sixteen UNITWIN/UNESCOChairs that received awards during the World Forum of UNESCOChairs,(November 2002) to mark the programme’s 10th anniversary.Available online: www.unesco.org/education/initwin
Report on the Fourth Meeting of the High-Level Groupon Education for All, Brasilia, Brazil (8-10 November 2004).This meeting focused on the quality of education, teachers andresource mobilization. E-mail: [email protected]
Towards an AIDS-Free Generation - Briefs for Decision-makers. These briefs on the newGlobal Initiative on HIV/AIDS and Educationprovides information on how to plan, manage,improve and evaluate HIV/AIDS preventioneducation. This UNAIDS initiative, launched in2004, aims to help governments implementcomprehensive, nation-wide educationprogrammes for young people. Published by theUNESCO International Institute for EducationPlanning (IIEP). Website: www.unesco.org/aids
Policy Review Report: Early childhood Care and Education in Indonesia (UNESCO doc. ED-2005/WS/5), and Early Childhood Care and Education in Kenya,(UNESCO doc. ED/2005/WS/13).Early Childhood and Family Policy Series, Nos. 10 and 11.Available online: www.unesco.org/education/ecf
Implementing and Financing Education for All. This bookletsummarizes the debates at the International Seminar on Financingand Implementing National Education Plans,(Korea, 17-21 September2003). It focuses on the lessons learned from the experiences of the participating countries. Education Policies and Strategies, 6.E-mail: [email protected]
The White Book of our Future, Egypt. In this booklet, produced inthe framework of the white book of our future educational initiativelaunched by UNESCO and P.A.U. Education, Egyptian street childrenexpress themselves freely about their daily lives and how theyimagine their future. The third in the series, after Mali and Honduras,it is available in English and Arabic. E-mail: [email protected]
Exploring and Understanding Gender in Education: A QualitativeManual for Education Practitioners and Gender Focal Points.This manual is about how to conduct qualitative research to promotegender equality in the classroom, the school and in the widereducational system. It provides the knowledge and tools tounderstand gender disparities in education, their causes, and howthey can be overcome. Available online: www.unescobkk.org/index
Highland Children’s Education Project: A Pilot Project onBilingual Education in Cambodia. This report documents the modelof bilingual primary education provided for the Tampuen and Kreungethnic minority groups in six remote villages in the northeasternprovince of Ratanakiri, Cambodia.Available online: www.unescobkk.org/index
UNESCO and Sustainable Development.This brochure outlines UNESCO’s actions forsustainable development in its different fieldsof competence and provides examples ofpartnerships, country ownership and UNESCOactions linked to literacy, teachers, HIV/AIDS.E-mail: [email protected]