Giving girls their time, rights and future, begins with educating them
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Loading... - Kesse Anim
- 24 Oct 2022
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World leaders at the UN Transforming Education Summit last month received a very clear message on equality. Without it, education cannot be transformed.
“We all use the word transformative a lot – not only at this historic Summit. But in this case, the evidence is undeniable. Gender equality is transformative,” UNICEF Executive Director Catherine Russell told the Summit.
“When girls and women have an equal opportunity to learn – and when education supports gender equality for all – communities and societies prosper.”
There is a long way to go. According to UNESCO, 129 million girls around the world are out of school, including 32 million of primary school age. Just under half of the countries have achieved gender parity in primary education.
This year’s UN International Day of the Girl Child has the theme “Our time is now—our rights, our future.”
Urgency is essential. The covid pandemic and long school closures increased global levels of learning poverty. Only about 35% of children worldwide can read a simple sentence at the age of 10. In sub-Saharan Africa, that figure is just 10%.
Even when schools reopened, girls were less likely to return to education than boys. As many as 11 million didn’t go back to school.
Yet it is clear – as Catherine Russell affirmed – that educating girls benefits not just them, but their societies and entire nations.
One additional year in school can lead to a 25% increase in wages in later life for girls. The cost of girls failing to complete education is between US$15 trillion and US$30 trillion in lost lifetime productivity and earnings for countries, estimates the World Bank.
Sadly it is already clear that the Strategic Development Goal of providing quality education to all by 2030 – SDG4 – will be missed. The Bank’s latest report predicts SDG1 – the goal of ending extreme poverty – is also unlikely to be achieved, unless there is an urgent refocus on key investments, including education. Read More...
