Reaching the marginalized: EFA global monitoring report, 2010; 2010

0120CHAPTER 3Education for All Global Monitoring ReportExtreme andpersistentdeprivation ineducation carriesa high pricefor societiesas well as forindividualsArticle 28). The right to equal opportunity foreducation is also enshrined in most countries’national laws and constitutions. Indeed, fewhuman rights are more widely endorsed – andmore widely violated.Millions of children are denied their human rightto education for the simple reason that theirparents cannot afford to keep them in school.Social and cultural barriers to education formanother formidable obstacle. In many countries,the education of girls is widely perceived as beingof less value than that of boys, with traditionalpractices such as early marriage adding anotherlayer of disadvantage. Members of ethnic minoritiesoften face deeply entrenched obstacles to equalopportunity. Denied an opportunity to learn in theirown language and faced with social stigmatization,they are set on an early pathway to disadvantage.Millions of children with disabilities across theworld also face far more restricted opportunitiesthan their peers, as do children living in regionsaffected by conflict.None of these disadvantages operates in isolation.Poverty, gender, ethnicity and other characteristicsinteract to create overlapping and self-reinforcinglayers of disadvantage that limit opportunity andhamper social mobility.The interaction between marginalization ineducation and wider patterns of marginalizationoperates in both directions. Being educated isa vital human capability that enables people tomake choices in areas that matter. The lack ofan education restricts choices. It limits the scopepeople have for influencing decisions that affecttheir lives. People lacking literacy and numeracyskills face a heightened risk of poverty, insecureemployment and ill health. Poverty and ill health,in turn, contribute to marginalization in education.So does the fact that the marginalized have onlya weak voice in shaping political decisionsaffecting their lives.Reaching marginalized children requires politicalcommitment backed by practical policies. Whengovernments met in 1990 at the World Conferenceon Education for All in Jomtien, Thailand, theyrecognized the need to overcome extremeinequalities holding back progress in education.They declared that ‘consistent measures must betaken to reduce disparities’ and called for activecommitment to reach ‘underserved groups’,including the poor, remote rural populations,ethnic, racial and linguistic minorities, refugeesand migrants, and those affected by conflict(UNESCO, 1990, Article 3). The Dakar Frameworkfor Action reaffirmed the commitment to ‘explicitlyidentify, target and respond flexibly to the needsand circumstances of the poorest and the mostmarginalized’ (UNESCO, 2000, IV, para. 52).While some countries have made impressiveefforts to back up such words by extendingeducational opportunities to their mostmarginalized populations, action has generallyfallen far short of the commitments made atJomtien and Dakar. Marginalization has remaineda peripheral concern. The assumption has beenthat national progress in education wouldeventually trickle down to the most disadvantaged.After a decade of steady but uneven nationalprogress, it is time to abandon that assumption.In many countries, large swathes of societyare being left behind as a result of inheriteddisadvantages. Breaking down thesedisadvantages will require a far stronger focuson the hard to reach.Tackling marginalization is a matter of urgencyon several counts. The targets for 2015 adoptedin the Dakar Framework for Action – includinguniversal primary education – will not beachieved unless governments step up theirefforts to reach the marginalized. Sustainingprogress in basic education and creating thefoundations for advances in secondary educationwill require a renewed drive to extendopportunity to individuals and groups facingthe most deeply entrenched disadvantages.Progress in combating marginalization ineducation would dramatically improve thediscouraging scenario that Chapter 2 describes.The case for action on marginalization goesbeyond the 2015 targets. Extreme and persistentdeprivation in education carries a high pricefor societies as well as for individuals. In theincreasingly knowledge-based and competitiveglobal economy, depriving people of opportunitiesfor education is a prescription for wastage of skills,talent and opportunities for innovation andeconomic growth. It is also a recipe for socialdivision. Marginalization in education is animportant factor in the widening of social andeconomic inequalities. Working towards moreinclusive education is a condition for thedevelopment of more inclusive societies.136