Summary

GENDER SUMMARY
EDUCATION FOR ALL GLOBAL MONITORING REPORT 2015
Challenges and policy solutions to
achieve gender equality post-2015
Entrenched
discriminatory
social norms
undermine
the benefits
of girls’
and young
women’s
improved
access to
education
Persistent barriers to achieving
equality in education
Multiple and often intersecting barriers still
prevent millions of children, young people and
adults from accessing and attaining good quality,
gender-equitable education. This section examines
such constraints.
Social institutions – formal and informal laws, and
social and cultural norms and practices – can help
explain why gender parity and equality in education
have not been achieved in some countries. Analysis
based on the OECD’s 2012 Social Institutions and
Gender Index (SIGI) found that countries with higher
levels of discrimination against women generally
performed worse on development indicators,
including education (OECD, 2012a).
Structural barriers and entrenched discriminatory
social norms reduce demand for girls’ education,
restrict access and undermine the benefits of
girls’ and young women’s improved access to
education. These norms are reflected in practices
such as early marriage, gender-based violence,
traditional seclusion practices that restrict travel to
schools, the favouring of boys in families’ education
investment and the gendered division of household
labour. Once in schools or non-formal programmes,
discriminatory gender norms and stereotypes –
conveyed in teaching and learning resources and
practices – can damage learners’ self-esteem and
limit their expectations and achievements, as well
as reinforce inequalities in wider society. Social
and gender norms also affect boys’ education.
Within certain communities and groups, continued
education for boys and young men is undervalued,
leading to their disengagement and dropout
from school (Box 4). Poverty and the need or
desire to work also underpin constraints on boys’
completion of schooling.
Early marriage and adolescent pregnancy
limit girls’ education
Early entry into marriage and pregnancy limits
adolescent girls’ access to and continuation in
education. School attendance is often incompatible
with the responsibilities and expectations of
marriage and motherhood (Mensch et al., 2005;
Omoeva et al., 2014). This is not a one-way
relationship, however, for a lack of schooling
opportunities and/or extenuating factors that result
in some girls dropping out of school can also lead
to early marriage (Lloyd and Mensch, 2006). As
the 2013/14 GMR notes, a strong body of evidence
indicates girls’ participation in formal education is
itself an important factor in delaying marriage and
child-bearing (UNESCO, 2014c). Decisions about
education, age of marriage and pregnancy can be
a result of combined underlying factors, including
poverty, gender norms, household composition, and
the accessibility and quality of education provision
(Psaki, 2015a). Conflict and humanitarian crises
also exacerbate girls’ vulnerability to early marriage
(Lemmon, 2014).
Legislation has been strengthened but is not
sufficient to eliminate child marriage
International human rights law forbids child
marriage. In the Programme of Action adopted at
the 1994 International Conference on Population
and Development, signatories agreed to enforce
laws against child marriage. And regional treaties,
including the African Charter on Human and
People’s Rights and the African Protocol on the
Rights of Women (2004), commit governments
to prevent child marriage. Of 55 developing
countries with data, the legal age of marriage
increased between 1990 and 2000 for women in
23 countries, and for men in 20. As of 2010, 158
countries had laws that set 18 as the legal age of
marriage for girls without parental consent (Loaiza
and Wong, 2012).
26