Strategies for Promoting Education of Girls

Nations around the world have formulated a number of strategies that have been successful in promoting girls' education in different settings.

1. Advocacy for girls' education. This is the most important strategy for raising awareness in society about the economic and social benefits of girls' education, and the economic and social costs of keeping girls uneducated. Parents need to be convinced that the benefits of educating daughters out weight the costs.

2. Lower the costs for parents. Lowering the costs by eliminating school fees, the requirement of school uniforms, providing scholarships to girl, and day-care facilities for younger siblings have been found effective by many countries. Bangladesh, India, and Guatemala have experimented successfully with scholarship programme for girls, especially to encourage them to persist in secondary schools.

3. Develop relevant and gender-sensitive curricula. To increase parental demand for girls' education, the curriculum must be made relevant for girls' everyday life and future job requirements; it should link education with farming, health, nutrition, sanitation, and local environment; employ the local language; and eliminate gender stereotyping.

4. Promote recruitment and training of female teachers. Many countries are trying innovative ways to recruit and train female teachers, such as financial incentives; quota systems (Bangladesh); and lowering the minimum qualifications but making up for this by intensive training and close supervision.

5. Improve access by reducing distance to school and providing culturally appropriate facilities in response to girls' special needs. Innovations such as satellite schools, cluster schools, and multi-grade classes have been used to increase the availability of schooling facilities.

6. Promote community participation in planning, development, and management of education programs.

7. Develop flexible school calendar, timing, and mode of teaching around girls' domestic chores. Community participation in planning ensures this.

8. Promote literacy training of parents. Many countries cite lack of parental education as an important constraint on girls' education. But in order to be effective in attracting participation, adult literacy training for women needs to be combined with skill training and income - generating activities.

9. Use of multiple delivery systems. Formal, non-formal, and alternative schools, and all forms of communication, both traditional and modern, need to be used to provide education to girls. This is essential in view of the inadequacy of funds, physical facilities, and trained teachers.

All of the above strategies are based on two guiding principles: first, the principle of affirmative action for girls' education must be applied; girls must be targeted as the main beneficiaries in programme design and delivery. Second, the overall status of women in society must be improved, as girls' educational deprivation cannot be separated from the broader issue of women's status.