Education for all a distant dream

In 2000, at the World Education Forum at Dakar in Senegal, 164 governments along with partner organisations from across the world made a commitment to expand educational opportunities for the world’s children and the young by 2015. Cover page of the report / Photo credit: UNESCO UNESCO’s Global Monitoring Report: Education for All by 2015? Will we make it? shows that the comprehensive vision of the Dakar agenda is in danger of being lost. The report takes stock of the situation after eight years to measure the progress made by the international community on the six Education for ALL (EFA) goals viz.- • Early childhood care and education • Universal Primary Education • Learning needs of young people and adults • Adult literacy • Gender • Quality The report highlights lack of early childhood care and education (ECCE) programmes and uneven pre-primary education as two major problems in realising the goal of Education for All. Though, significant progress has been made on several fronts. Many countries have adopted targeted strategies to increase school enrollment rate and promote girl-child education. Aid to basic education has significantly improved since 2000, though a recent downturn is a cause of concern, says the report. The report provides region-wise assessment of the policy initiatives to throw light on which countries are progressing and what kinds of strategies have bore fruits. Only 53% of the world’s countries have ECCE programmes for children under three. Countries like Bhutan, Bangladesh and Nepal do not have such programmes. There is a need to match primary education resources with ECCE needs (such as using primary school teachers and classrooms for the benefit of younger children). In Bangladesh and India, the increased enrollment rate has been accompanied by greater geographic disparity. Moreover, shortage of trained primary teachers is another stumbling block in fulfilling the EFA goal. According to the report,the main challenge is to ensure increasing diversity of children receiving quality education regardless of their social background. Other key issues like rising HIV/AIDS pandemic, rapid urbanisation and demands of knowledge societies need to be addressed to meet the objective of universal basic education. The report aims to inform and influence education and aid policy through an authoritative, evidence-based review of progress and a balanced analysis of the most critical challenges facing countries. The publication sets out an ambitious agenda for reform. Decision-makers – ministers, policy-makers, parliamentarians and education planners – are a prime audience. Source: UNESCO

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