SEPIA III- Gender and Education
Proposals
for Integrating a Gender Perspective in Education presented to
the
III Meeting of Ministers of Education
1.
Progress
and challenges in education
Until a
few decades ago, the main education demands, from a gender perspective,
were focused on overcoming the gap in education between men and women.
There were significant disparities in illiteracy rates between the sexes
in almost all countries in the region, especially for rural and older
women. Moreover, educational systems provided significantly less basic
and secondary education coverage to girls than to boys.
These gaps are being
overcome in most countries in the Hemisphere. Girls and boys have
virtually equal access to basic and secondary education. Several
countries have high percentages of women in higher education, and the
illiteracy gap has narrowed considerably.
This progress is
taking place in a context of increased schooling for the entire
population. In the 1990s in Latin America, the working-age population
(persons age 15 and over) grew at a rate of 3.1%, while the number of
professionals and specialists (ages 25 to 59) increased at an annual
rate of 7.5% -- that rate was higher for women (8.7%) than for men
(6.4%).
Despite this considerable progress, the lag in education from decades
past accounts for the fact that roughly 80% of the population ages 25 to
59 in 2000 did not have a technical or professional education.
Retention rates in the
educational system are low, particularly among low-income sectors,
despite a significant increase in preschool education, basic education
coverage, and secondary school enrollment. This leaves children and
youth lacking the training they need to effectively join the labor
market, thereby breeding poverty.
For women, these disadvantages are compounded by the persistence of
discriminatory mechanisms in the labor market that contribute to an even
more precarious employment status, such as greater difficulties in
combining domestic work with salaried jobs, more limited occupational
options resulting from the segmentation of employment by sex, and income
disparities between men and women.
In this context, education for women represents a fundamental
mechanism for social mobility and autonomy as well as a means to pass
the value of education on to their children.
This situation
presents great challenges for the education reforms being carried out in
most countries in the region.
2.
Including proposals for a
gender perspective in education among the commitments of the Summits of
the Americas
The Summits of the Americas have addressed the topic of education with
particular interest. The heads of state and government participating in
the First Summit of the Americas in Miami called for access to quality
education; adult education and professional training; technical,
professional, and teacher training; increasing access to and
strengthening the quality of higher education; universal access to
education for women; strategies to overcome nutritional deficiencies;
decentralization; and community participation.
At the Second Summit of the Americas, the governments planned to implement
compensatory educational policies for the most vulnerable groups; use
indicators to assess the quality of education; and develop
comprehensive programs to improve and increase the level of
professionalism among teachers and school administrators and
train workers, considering the adoption of new technologies. They also
recognized the need to include the following in education: democratic
principles, human rights, gender-related issues, peace, tolerance, and
respect for the environment and natural resources.
They further identified that education reforms are based on equity,
quality, relevance, and efficiency in education.
The Third Summit of the Americas recognized the value of an educated
citizenry in achieving more democratic societies, economic growth, and
social equity. That acknowledgement led to agreements on devising
policies to improve access to quality education through teacher
training, civic education, and use of information technologies in the
classroom, to help reduce income inequalities in the Hemisphere. The
mandates from the Third Summit address five main topics: 1) quality and
equity; 2) management and decentralization, social participation, and
teacher training; 3) training, secondary education, and certification of
job skills; 4) higher education, science and technology, and academic
mobility; and 5) new technologies applied to education.
In pursuance of the mandates of the Third Summit of the Americas, the
Meeting of Ministers of Education was established as a political forum
with the aim of developing guidelines, programs, and strategies for
horizontal cooperation based on the positions taken by the Heads of
State and Government. The
Second Meeting of Ministers of Education was held at Punta del Este in
September 2001, under the auspices of the Inter-American Council for
Integral Development (CIDI). At
that meeting the Ministers recognized the progress made in the education
field and reaffirmed their commitment to developing and implementing
projects in the five dimensions identified: (a) quality and equity in
education; (b) improved management, decentralization, social
participation, and teacher training in the education system; (c) youth
training, secondary education, and certification of job skills; (d)
strengthening of higher education, science and technology, and academic
mobility; and (e) application of new technologies to education.
a.
Quality and equity in education
Quality and equity in education are inseparable
principles when it comes to improving living conditions, particularly
for the poorest population segments. Only to the extent that there is quality for all can equity
be achieved. Although girls
and women may be considered a vulnerable group, to be accorded priority
attention they must be included in specific actions, especially in the
rural sectors, which still lag behind other sectors in several countries
of the hemisphere, to eliminate existing inequities in terms of access
to education as well as discriminatory teaching practices.
This principle holds particularly true when one considers the
multiplier effect of education for mothers, in terms of encouraging
their children to attend and stay in school, improving health conditions
for the family, and helping the region’s most dispossessed families
overcome poverty, as well as other aspects of social development, such
as maternal and infant mortality, health, nutrition and education of new
generations, population control and environmental protection, social
integration, and the development of citizenship.
b.
Improved management, decentralization, social participation, and teacher
training in the education system
The management and decentralization of
education systems have proven to be an effective mechanism for
strengthening strategies for social participation in the education
process. The
decentralization processes carried out in the hemisphere have opened
significant opportunities for participation by women at the local level,
where they have played leadership roles in their communities.
On the one hand, participation by women in the
management of education at the community level can be viewed as a source
of training for new leaders, strengthening their participation, opening
possibilities for positive solutions to education problems, and
developing relations with other local interests and authorities. Women have been actively engaged at the local level,
facilitating the integration of education with other related sectors.
On the other hand, the traditionally greater involvement of women
than men in the education of their children, a role almost exclusively
assumed by women, tends to strengthen gender roles, with education of
the children assigned as the responsibility of the mother.
This area therefore represents fertile ground for greater family
involvement – mothers and fathers – in the management of education,
thereby influencing how these roles are shaped and promoting equality
between men and women in domestic matters, including education.
The challenge of creating educational settings
designed as learning communities naturally extends to teachers, whose
responsibility it is to promote democratic values, equity and tolerance,
as opposed to authoritarianism and rigid hierarchies. Teacher training
therefore needs to incorporate principles promoting these values, and in
particular nondiscrimination for reasons of gender, throughout the
education system.
c.
Youth training, secondary education, and certification of job skills
The results that have been achieved in
increasing the coverage of basic education, and the increase in
enrollment in secondary education, are not as yet reflected in the
expectations people have with respect to the labor market.
It must be borne in mind that students who reach the higher
education level are a small percentage.
Accordingly, education needs to be reoriented toward employment,
so that students get the training they need to hold jobs and enhance the
human capital of countries in the region.
For women, such training is particularly important, since their
employment options are limited by the prevalence of stereotypes
concerning masculine and feminine work, the latter being more
restrictive and less valued in the labor market. On many occasions, options for women are limited to informal
employment with low levels of productivity, or domestic employment,
given their lack of training to qualify them for other, better paid
occupations that would afford them of the economic autonomy necessary to
support themselves and their families.
We also know that women take on a variety of
jobs in their daily lives that they have learned empirically.
Certification of such skills should be part of the education
process.
d.
Strengthening of higher education, science and technology, and academic
mobility
The percentage of students starting basic and secondary education who go
on to higher education continues to be very small. The percentage is very small and tends to be closely linked
to the socioeconomic status of the students’ homes. From a gender perspective, while the gap between male and
female enrollment at this level has been narrowing, there is a
persistent segmentation of university courses of study, with high
concentrations of women in some fields and a minority in others.
In redefining higher education, proposals to expand the career
options of men and women, encouraging both sexes two enter courses of
study where they have been absent in the past.
Access to this level of education, therefore, continues to be
characterized by socioeconomic and gender-based discrimination, which
calls for effective mechanisms for combining equity with quality at this
educational level.
e.
Application of new technologies to education
The rapid change and innovation observed in the areas of technology,
connectivity, and communication must be brought to bear in the field of
education in order to close the education quality gap in the more
isolated and vulnerable sectors. Based
on the respective roles assigned to each sex, women have traditionally
been less involved in the use of technology.
Efforts to apply technology to the education process should give
special attention to exposing girls as well as boys to the application
of innovative technologies, avoiding sexist discrimination in their use.
3.
The gender perspective in education
The CIM Biennial Work
Plan 2002-2004, stipulates in its priority areas of action that
“[g]ender-sensitive education is a way to form new values and change
attitudes. It is essential in guaranteeing the full exercise of
women’s rights with a view to including them at all levels of the
political arena, allowing them to enter and remain in the labor market,
and enhance their quality of life. In the education area, the CIM
proposes developing activities that will produce and induce social and
cultural changes, eliminate stereotypes regarding domestic and work
roles, and create an awareness that men and women should share the tasks
of public and private life. It will, in general, focus attention on
women’s education throughout their life cycles, with special attention
to training programs for educationally disadvantaged groups, such as
minorities, people living in rural areas, marginal urban groups,
indigenous groups, and other ethnic groups.”
Specific objective 5 of the Inter-American
Program on the Promotion of Women’s Rights and Gender Equity calls on
OAS member states to promote
gender equity and women’s human rights, among other means by ensuring
their " full and equal access to education at all levels and
to the various fields of study".
This appeal is reaffirmed by specific objective 8, with "the
elimination of cultural patterns or stereotypes that denigrate the image
of women, particularly in educational materials…".
In terms of activities to be conducted by the OAS General
Secretariat, this same program calls for the adoption of measures
needed to promote the incorporation of this perspective into the work of
the agencies of the inter-American system.
In this context, the CIM proposal for incorporating a gender perspective
in the Third Meeting of Ministers of Education is based on the premise that this, in addition to being a mechanism for
social mobility, integration, and overcoming poverty, is a prime sphere
for fostering cultural change to help achieve gender equity. Although
equal access for women to all levels of education is an essential step
forward, there are other factors that are related to the potential that
lies in educating girls and boys about the values of equity, tolerance,
respect for diversity, and civic education.
Education with a
gender perspective is understood as educating girls and boys from a very
early age on principles of equity between the sexes, to pave the way for
overcoming the greatest barriers stemming from gender inequity, among
other factors, and for equal access to the labor market; it brings about
cultural change in both men and women, such as responsible parenthood
and equal sharing of housework. It also creates the conditions for
empowering women and, therefore, for forging a more just and equitable
society.
Furthermore, there is
a direct correlation between women’s level of education and
opportunities for boosting household income; their education level also
impacts their health and that of their family and, as shown below, is a
factor in reducing the dropout rate for their children.
Nonetheless, in order
to integrate a gender perspective in education, changes are needed in
areas ranging from legislation to education management, including
changes in the behavior of teachers, revising sexist messages in
textbooks, and equal vocational guidance for boys and girls, among other
aspects.
4.
Toward
gender equity in education
Certainly, from a
gender analysis standpoint, it is essential to grant girls and boys
equal opportunities to access the different levels of schooling.
However, there are other factors that, if upheld or changed,
could perpetuate or eliminate gender inequities in different aspects of
individuals’ lives.
Starting at the
preschool level, the countries in the region have recorded higher
enrollment, which was motivated by the need for the educational system
to improve girls and boys preparedness at the basic education level,
which is a valid, high-impact reason. However, the supply is
insufficient given women’s mass entry into the labor market. The scant
coverage of child care centers extends to the preschool level, creating
a barrier to entry into the labor market for the female labor force,
since women continue to be almost exclusively responsible for child
rearing. In this regard, “enrollment at this level has risen in a
manner consistent with the internal logic of the system, instead of with
the demand stemming from women’s entry into the labor market, which
leaves much to be done”.
Basic and secondary
enrollment have risen considerably, with average enrollment among
countries in the Hemisphere of 90% for primary and 50% for secondary,
and in several countries in the region enrollment is higher for women
than for men. Nonetheless, the number of young people who complete those
levels is dropping substantially.
One of the most
serious problems in education is the dropout rate. When those rates are
broken down by gender, they duplicate sexist patterns found in society.
Periodic household surveys in countries in the region found that the
reasons why students drop out before completing secondary differ greatly
by gender: among boys it is primarily to work or look for employment;
among girls it is because of family problems, including pregnancy or
motherhood and household duties.
|
Reasons
for dropping out of school among young people ages 15 to 19.
Selected countries.
(percentages)
|
|
|
|
Reasons
|
|
|
|
Economic
|
Family
|
|
Bolivia
|
Boys
|
50
|
15
|
|
|
Girls
|
38
|
41
|
|
Chile
|
Boys
|
34
|
4
|
|
|
Girls
|
14
|
50
|
|
El
Salvador
|
Boys
|
47
|
5
|
|
|
Girls
|
22
|
49
|
|
Nicaragua
|
Boys
|
38
|
-
|
|
|
Girls
|
7
|
-
|
|
Paraguay
|
Boys
|
21
|
1
|
|
|
Girls
|
14
|
14
|
|
Peru
|
Boys
|
17
|
2
|
|
|
Girls
|
6
|
31
|
|
Dominican
Rep.
|
Boys
|
35
|
-
|
|
|
Girls
|
20
|
-
|
|
Venezuela
|
Boys
|
37
|
1
|
|
|
Girls
|
12
|
32
|
|
Source:
Based on ECLAC data (Social Panorama 2001-2002).
|
These attrition
figures show that gender patterns persist, affecting young people’s
decision to leave school; these patterns are consistent with gender
socialization in which boys assume a role as provider and girls assume a
domestic role.
Early pregnancy –a
growing phenomenon in recent decades– is an important cause of
attrition among girls. It impacts the life of these young women in many
ways, reducing their opportunities to pursue studies, which makes it
difficult to find high-quality jobs that would enable them to support
themselves and their children. Adequate sexual education starting in
junior high school would promote a drop in teenage motherhood and foster
responsible fatherhood.
One factor that has a
major impact on school dropout rates is household poverty; however
another important factor is a mother with a low level of education:
among young people whose mother has little schooling (5 years or less),
over 40% in the urban sector have dropped out of school and 55% in rural
areas. In contrast, for those whose mother completed at least primary
school, that figure drops to 15% in urban areas and 34% in rural areas.
In view of this, emphasis on increasing education coverage for girls and
reducing their dropout rate has a long-term impact that is felt in
successive generations.
With regard to higher
education, on average women have achieved similar coverage and, in
several countries in the Hemisphere, higher coverage than their male
peers; however there is strong gender segmentation in courses of study.
Women have much lower enrollment in the sciences than men.
A high percentage of
young women pursue studies that reproduce feminine roles, including
education and health, which have lower status and earnings. The teaching
male and female students receive from the basic level on is implicit in
young people’s options. Boys receive more attention in the sciences
than girls; in secondary school, vocational guidance steers boys and
girls towards pre-determined interests, according to their gender. In
this way, the hidden agenda, which makes distinctions between the
treatment and guidance of boys and girls, defines their preferences.
The images portrayed
in textbooks also play an important role here. Although some countries
have begun to review textbooks from a gender perspective in the
framework of the educational reforms they are implementing, in many
countries there are still stereotypical images of men and women based on
gender roles or the image of women is given less importance than that of
men.
In this way, sexist
vocational guidance in school sidelines a large contingent of women from
the science and technology labor market, marginalizing them from
cutting-edge productive activities, which are the ones in greatest
supply due to market transformations brought on by economic integration
and globalization.
In short, the progress
made in women’s access to formal education is out of line with the
benefits they can expect, inasmuch as gender equalities persist that, in
general, are manifested in a low correlation between improving their
standards of living and, in particular, the persistence of difficulties
in accessing skilled jobs, consistent with higher levels of education.
The main barriers to breaking through this breakdown between education
and better living conditions are related to several factors:
- Unequal
distribution of family responsibilities, giving women sole
responsibility for the home, is exacerbated by the numerous roles
they play and the lack of domestic support services and adversely
affects their professional opportunities.
- Sexist
language that conceals women’s experience and participation in
society, as well as in teaching practices and methodologies, which
is one of the most subtle but effective manifestations of indirect
discrimination. All of this reinforces the division of labor by
gender, restricting women’s options in selecting a profession.
- The
limited correlation between the supply of education and market
demand has an adverse impact on women in particular, inasmuch as
they need special support to break out of internalized general views
in order to access innovative areas of activity or those providing
more and better job opportunities.
Training, which is
considered informal education, is one alternative for building the
skills of persons who did not complete their formal education or who
would like to gain expertise to improve their job opportunities.
In this area, training
systems do not adequately take into account women’s situation.
Firstly, there is a lack of flexibility in the structure of courses,
which have high entry requirements; many courses are long or have a
schedule incompatible with family responsibilities. In addition, support
services for child care are lacking. Together, these constitute a
barrier to entry or cause women to drop out before the training is
completed.
Based on the foregoing, the following lines of action are being proposed,
to ensure women’s full access to and continued participation in the
educational system, as well as promote and incorporate gender equity in
teaching.
5.
Proposals
for incorporating a gender perspective in education
Incorporating a gender perspective requires a comprehensive approach to
ensure that the initiatives in different areas are mutually reinforcing.
In each specific area mutually complementary proposals are
advanced as parallel means to close the gender gap and the persistence
of gender-based discrimination in education.
1.
Legislation
-
To review current regulations and make the necessary changes to
eliminate legal barriers, where they exist, that impede access to
education on equal footing for men and women.
2.
Inter-agency
coordination
o
To forge
inter-agency alliances between national mechanisms for women’s
equality and the ministries of education, in order to design and
implement awareness-raising and training programs from a gender
perspective for those responsible for formulating education programs and
policies, ensuring they are funded in the budget.
o
To design and implement joint programs with national
mechanisms for women’s equality that are transferred to the ministries
of education as permanent programs for teaching staff on the gender
perspective, sexual education, equity, and integral development and
training, with ongoing programs and methodologies to ensure they are
applied in the classroom.
o
To design indicators to monitor the incorporation of a gender perspective
in education policies, in coordination with the countries’ national
statistics offices.
o
To achieve
coordination between the training system and the productive sector to
determine needs and update job profiles, provide feedback to the
information system on labor supply and demand, and determine existing
employment opportunities for women.
3.
Revision
of the educational curriculum following a gender analysis
o
To eliminate differing requirements in the curriculum for boys and girls,
encouraging both to learn about gender neutral tasks.
o
To eliminate requirements that, based on gender, prevent male and female
students from participating in differentiated electives.
o
To review textbooks to eliminate messages that reproduce sexist
stereotypes or do not provide a balanced portrayal of the skills and
functions of men and women and to delete discriminatory language.
o
To introduce sexual education in the regular curriculum for all levels of
education.
o
To review curriculum developments in training, to ensure its relevance
and to update it with respect to the required skills, so as not to
repeat or strengthen gender stereotypes, particularly with respect to
segmentation of tasks and occupations.
4.
Teacher
training
o
To identify and eliminate stereotypes in teaching practices, such as the
transmission of messages that promote gender inequity, differentiated
use of space for men and women, and discounting or ignorance of female
students’ needs and interests.
o
To sensitize and train teaching staff about the importance of encouraging
girls’ interest in science and technology.
o
To sensitize and train guidance counselors about the importance of girls
and teens selecting more diverse areas of study and occupations, instead
of steering them towards traditionally feminine ones.
5.
The
educational community
o
To sensitize the educational community, particularly for the most
disadvantaged groups and stressing rural sectors, about the importance
of girls and boys staying in school, equal opportunity between the
sexes, and the equitable distribution of responsibilities in the home,
as well as in various economic and social activities.
6.
Hemispheric
projects
Gender
criteria need to be established for approving and implementing
compensatory projects that are aimed at overcoming gender inequities in
the formal and informal education of women. To that end, the following
courses of action are proposed:
o
Educational programs
for adult women aimed at reducing illiteracy, in accordance with their
needs, language, and culture, establishing special support for
illiterate and functionally-illiterate women.
o
Promote a multicultural approach in the curriculum for indigenous girls
and boys and, particularly, for indigenous women that is consistent with
their needs, aspirations, and culture.
o
Programs and actions
targeting groups of women living in adverse conditions: poor women with
low levels of education, female heads of household, teenage mothers,
etc., and supplementing and coordinating them with other related
institutional programs or services.
o
Promote continuing education, particularly targeting older adult women.
o
Establish gender studies programs in universities at the undergraduate
and graduate levels.
o
Develop key skills
for employability, enabling women, particularly poor women, to extend
their influence, adapt to, and change their environment, by fostering
entrepreneurial capacity and cooperation strategies.
o
Educational programs and projects that contribute to the comprehensive
training and employment of women, with a flexible curriculum tailored to
their skills and schedules.
o
Diversification of women’s participation in professional and technical
training, to steer them towards dynamic activities with development
potential, and to improve their access to management, supervisory, and
executive functions, particularly in areas where they are
underrepresented.
