Editorials

While school enrolment has expanded dramatically over the past 35 years in most
of the developing world, this has not been the case in many African countries.
Inability to stem the steep downward enrolment trends that became manifest in the
economic crisis years of the 1990s, these countries in the late 1990s have
disturbing educational profiles. Only half of their children attend primary school,
adult literacy rates are below 30 per cent, and over 65 per cent of women are
illiterate. Such a profile has grave implications for Africa’s development.
The ultimate purpose of schooling is to provide children with an education that
provides them with the skills to participate and contribute fully in their societies. It
is estimated that over 10 million teachers will be needed worldwide by 2015.
Improving the quality of education will require recruiting and retaining trained
teachers, increased inputs such as textbooks and classrooms, and increased
monitoring and evaluation with national and regional testing.
In order to reinvigorate commitments to global education, donors and developing
countries need to use the momentum generated in 2010 to increase the quality of
education and reach marginalized children. Although developing countries have
significantly increased the number of children enrolled in primary school over the
past decade, progress improving primary school quality and completion, as well as
access to secondary school and higher levels, has been much slower. Donor
partners need to support country efforts to improve quality and completion, and
focus on ensuring long-term and predictable development assistance to enable
countries to meet recurrent costs such as teacher salaries, which make up 70 or 80
percent of education budgets in most developing countries.
The majority of the children out-of-school globally belongs to marginalized
groups: young girls, children in rural areas or fragile states, and children with
disabilities. Reaching these children will require targeted policies and additional
resources.
New estimates predict that sub-Saharan Africa is facing a $13.8 billion annual
external financing gap in providing Universal Basic Education, with most of the
increase reflecting the additional resources needed to reach marginalized children.
42 percent of African countries have not reached gender parity in primary and
secondary education. The difficulties faced by marginalized children in attaining
an education have wide- spread ramifications.