Inez Eriksson
The gender parity in primary education has improved over the last years but we still have a long way to go before we reached a school where both genders have equally rights. An equal education not only involves access to but also safe environments in school for girls. What are the causes inequalities in education and how can we change the school system?
The situation today
Primary education is an important foundation for a child’s development. The percentage of children attending school is also a good indicator of the welfare of a country. In year 1995 an important meeting in Beijing was held where providing primary education to all children (both genders!) was the main theme. UNICEF writes that since the meeting there has been a lot of improvement in closing the gap between boys and girls attendance at school and children overall having access to primary education (UNICEF, 2020).
To measure how far we have come in our mission to provide primary education to all children and closing the gap one can use gender parity index. To understand further what it means I refer to WHO’s website where they write “The gender parity index in primary education is the ratio of the number of female students enrolled at the primary level compared to the number of male students” (WHO, n.d.). UNICEF defines gender parity as having a gender parity index between 0.97 and 1.03. While more than 2/3 of all countries have reached gender parity in enrollment in primary education there are still countries where the index is too low and in these countries girls are often the ones that are disadvantaged. Countries in South Asia, Africa and the Middle-Easter are overrepresented in terms of not reaching an adequate gender parity index (UNICEF, 2020).
The percentage of out of school boys as well as out of school girls has decreased between 2000 and 2018. Number of girls out of primary school decreased from 57 million to 32 million while number of boys out of primary school decreased from 42 million to 27 million. This means a 44% decrease for girls and a 37% decrease for boys. It is however important to notice the actual numbers at 2000 and 2018. A larger decrease in percentage for boys doesn’t mean the numbers are equal now or even near equal, we still have a long way to go to completely close the gap and get equal rights for girls. In addition, since 2007 the decrease in out of primary school children (both girls and boys) has stagnated due to the increasing child population (UNICEF, 2020).
What are the causes behind the inequalities for genders in education?
Since the case most often is that girls are disadvantaged I will focus on the causes why it is less likely to invest in girls’ education than boys. The causes I highlight are only a few examples of the many causes behind gender inequalities in education.
Seema Jayachandran writes in her paper “The Roots of Gender Inequality in Developing Countries” that a reason for gender inequality is patrilocality. Patrilocality is the cultural phenomenon where it is implied that when a woman marries a man they will live near or with the man’s family. This mean’s that the woman will be considered part of the man’s birth family rather than part of her own birth family. From an economic perspective it is therefore more profitable to invest in a son’s education and health than to invest in a daughter’s (Jayachandran, 2015).
A common reason for girls in developing countries to drop out of school is pregnancy. According to Human Rights Watch, Africa has the highest rate of adolescent pregnancies in the entire world. It is common for African girls to face all sorts of discrimination because of their pregnancies. A lot of the discrimination comes from personal opinions about marriage outside wedlock and the lack of morality that comes with it. It is not unusual for girls to be denied education due to their pregnancies (Humans Rights Watch, 2018).
The problem is not only that girls don’t have access to primary education but when they have access the safety in the environment around and in the school is lacking from both a physically and mentally aspect. The World Bank writes on their website that girls in developing countries often has a long way to school and this way is not safe. Too often, girls are sexually assaulted on their way to school. This of course leads to physically and mentally health damages and causes dropouts from school. The environment in school with gender bias is also problematic leading to girls having the perception they are denied many opportunities for their future that the boys have. This leads to girls not choosing certain academic areas (The World Bank, 2022).
What could be done?
Assistant professor of Economics Natalie Bau had the hypothesis matrilocal and patrilocal practices have two important effects. They ensure old-age support when there is no pension plan and they give an incitement on where (who) to invest in for the future to “pay off” as much as possible. Her study revealed that when introducing pension plans the customs of patrilocality and matrilocality are minimized. Since these customs lay ground for educational investment it has also been seen that when pension plans are introduced the educational investments in one specific gender is reduced leading to a more equal education for the genders (Bau, 2021).
Recently countries like Sierra Leone and Mozambique has lifted their bans of not allowing pregnant girls to attend school. Local norms regarding gender and a lack of good working institutions locally can have a negative impact on how these new “rules” are applied or actually how the old rules are no longer applied. However, this is huge success and an important foundation for reaching gender parity in primary education. Hopefully this can inspire other countries to follow their lead (International Institute for Educational Planning, 2021).
The countries in African Union adopted Agenda 2063 in 2013. This means they will, among other things, invest in equal education. In 2015 the African Union countries also committed to the SDG’s. A third positive news is African governments have ambitious goals in ending child marriage and introducing sexuality and reproductive health education (Humans Rights Watch, 2018).
Although we have a long way to go before primary education is provided equally no matter the gender I believe it is important to celebrate the small victories while aiming to achieve even better results.
Young girls in class in Nigeria (International Institute for Educational Planning, 2021)
References
Bau, N. (2021). Can Policy Change Culture? Government Pension Plans and Traditional Kinship Practices. American Economic Review, 111 (6): 1880-1917. https://www.aeaweb.org/articles?id=10.1257/aer.20190098
Humans Rights Watch. (2018, June 14). Leave No Girl Behind in Africa. https://www.hrw.org/report/2018/06/14/leave-no-girl-behind-africa/discrimination-education-against-pregnant-girls-and
International Institute for Educational Planning. (2021, July 19). Gender equality in education: Digging beyond the obvious. http://www.iiep.unesco.org/en/gender-equality-education-digging-beyond-obvious-13854
Jayachandran, S. (2015). The Roots of Gender Inequality in Developing Countries. Annual Review of Economics 2015 7:1, 63-88. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-economics-080614-115404
UNICEF. (2020). Gender and Education. https://data.unicef.org/topic/gender/gender-disparities-in-education/
WHO. (n.d.). Gender parity Index in primary level enrollment. Retrieved March 30, 2022, from https://www.who.int/data/nutrition/nlis/info/gender-parity-index-in-primary-level-enrolment
The World Bank. (2022, February 10). Girls’ Education. https://www.worldbank.org/en/topic/girlseducation#1