A fair chance - United Nations Girls' Education Initiative

A number of other ‘alternative’ schools that cater forchildren in remote and marginal areas also have manyof the same characteristics of community schools. Forexample, ActionAid has sponsored schools inEthiopia that have sought to confront the thorny issueof distance (see Box 15).In India, as in several Francophone African countries,the present expansion of government schools is beingmade possible by the employment of ‘para- teachers’who are from the local communities, but who are paidless, enjoy few benefits or career developmentopportunities, and have less training and lowerqualifications than teachers in government schools.This presents a dilemma for government policybecause the use of such teachers does enable schools tofunction, but at the risk of developing a ‘second tier’ ofeducation. Systematic evaluation is needed to ascertainthe impact of these schemes on quality and equity.Involving communitiesA lot has been done to raise community awareness ofthe importance of educating girls. Participatorymethods are now commonplace and used by NGOsand governments alike to promote greater grassrootsparticipation in education.Lok Jumbish (meaning People’s Movement) wasjointly established by the NGO and the Governmentof Rajistan in the early 1990s to respond to very lowenrolment, high dropout rates of girls, teacherabsenteeism, and lack of schools close to home. Ahighly effective and innovative approach has evolvedon the basis of widespread participation andexperimentation. Huge strides have been made inincreasing enrolments and encouraging more girlsinto school (see Box 16).UNICEF also has two major awareness-raisingprogrammes. The Meena Initiative in Bangladeshuses a multimedia approach to raise the profile ofgirls as well as stressing the importance of education.The Sara initiative in East, Central and SouthernAfrica was modelled on ‘Meena’. Materials producedare used in both formal and non-formal settings. Bothprogrammes have been supported by a number of bilateraldonors. Although Meena is considered to be asuccess in the South Asian context, adapting the sameset of materials from one cultural environment toanother has been problematic.Establishing bridging programmesThe main aim of bridging/accelerated programmeshas been to get children back into school. They sharesome of the characteristics of community schools,but tend to be more remedial in their approach(see Box 17).Box 17: Mahila Shikshan Vihar, JaloreSituated in the Jodhpur District of Rajasthan, the Mahila Shikshan Vihar (MSV), Jalore is an institution with a difference.Young women are motivated to participate in a residential crash education programme. Most of them have either dropped outof school, or have never been to one. Women are divided into eight groups of nine to twelve, according to their educationallevel and pace of learning. Teachers work with the groups, teaching, testing, and preparing them to take the Grade V exam.There is one teacher for every group of ten to twelve women – moving along at the pace of the learners. And what is more –these young women learn at such a fast pace that it leaves the teachers exhausted. They seem to have boundless energy forgames, music, theatre, cycling and even driving the solitary auto-rickshaw parked in the campus. They manage their food,washing, cleaning, and of course maintaining the school premises – including the kitchen and the garden. In the evenings andlate into the night – these bright young women can be seen huddled together studying, teaching and learning. Twenty-fourhours seem too short. It almost seems as if they were trying to catch up every minute of their childhood that was lost –enjoying every bit of it. The Jalore MSV can leave a visitor dizzy.Source: India report41