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

PROGRESS TOWARDS THE EFA GOALSUniversal primary educationFigure 2.13: Left behind: out-of-school girls are less likelyever to get into school% of out-of-school children who are expected never to enrol,by gender, selected countries, 2007Figure 2.14: Poor and rural children have much less chance of going to schoolin Burkina Faso and EthiopiaSchool exposure of out-of-school children by location and wealth, Burkina Faso (2003)and Ethiopia (2005)MaliNigerSenegalBurkina FasoTurkeyYemenGhanaPakistanEthiopiaBangladeshIndiaNepalSouth AfricaKenya100Burkina Faso100Ethiopia% of primary school age children80604020In schoolExpectedto enter lateEnrolled butdropped outExpectednever to enrol% of primary school age children80604020BoysGirls0RuralUrban0Poorest 20% Richest 20%0 20 40 60 80 100% of out-of-school children expected never to enrolSource: Bruneforth (2009b).Notes: Countries included had more than 500,000 children out of school in 2007.Source: Bruneforth (2009b).urban children to be out of school – and those notin classrooms are over four times less likely everto go to school. These disparities reflect some ofthe distinctive problems facing rural communities,including distance to school, poverty and genderdisadvantages.Poverty strongly influences prospects for schoolentry. Children from the poorest 20% of householdsdominate the out-of-school populations in manycountries and are far less likely than higher-incomechildren ever to enrol. To take one example, aroundthree-quarters of children from the poorest 20% ofhouseholds in Ethiopia are not in school. Of these,over half are not expected to enter school(Figure 2.14). The heightened risk of never goingto school associated with low household wealthunderlines the importance of public policies toensure that poverty does not automatically leadto educational disadvantage.Enrolment of school age childrenmoving too slowlyGetting children into school is just one of thestepping stones towards universal primaryeducation. As many children will drop out beforecompleting the primary cycle as are currently outof school. The critical challenge is not just gettingchildren into school but ensuring that, once there,they complete a good-quality education.Universal primary education is easily identifiedafter the event. It exists when almost all primaryschool age children graduate at roughly the officialage. Measuring progress towards this goal ismore challenging. No single indicator providesthe complete picture, but a combination ofmeasures can help cast light on different partsof a complicated picture. Overall, there is clearevidence that school enrolment and completionare increasing across the world, but a narrowfocus on certain indicators may be leading to anunderestimation of the distance still to be travelledto achieve universal primary education.Net enrolment ratios have been risingin the developing worldOne commonly used indicator, the net enrolmentratio, measures the proportion of students in theofficial primary school age group who are enrolledin school. In a system that has achieved universalprimary education, the vast majority of children inthe official age group will be in primary school.Universal net enrolment, widely used as a measureof progress towards Goal 2, is a necessary but notsufficient condition for universal primarycompletion. Countries with a net enrolment ratioclose to 100% have most of their primary schoolage children in the school system, but the measuredoes not indicate where children are in the cycle.Some children may have dropped out and returnedto early grades, while others may be repeatinggrades having failed school tests.The criticalchallenge isto ensure allchildren completea good-qualityeducation61