Neglect of education in slow-onset emergencies

'In Somalia in 2011, school enrolment rates plummeted due to the food crisis and large-scale displacement. The Education Cluster estimates that more than 1.8 million children aged 5–17 are out of school in South and Central Somalia alone – the worst-affected region, due to persistent and ongoing conflict and drought. The current education coverage and response supports only 20% of the school-age population in this zone. The availability of education for internally displaced persons (IDPs) and local host communities has not been sufficient to meet the need.  

Challenges to effectively delivering education in Somalia include:
• the lack of an appropriate curriculum
• inadequate learning spaces
• a lack of trained teachers from affected communities
• insufficient teacher remuneration and incentives for teaching
• the underlying challenge of the absence of a governance structure.  

Scarce teaching and learning materials are not enough to cover even the current low enrolment rates, made worse by the continued lack of funding for education in emergencies. 

In the Dollo Ado camp in Ethiopia and the Dadaab camp in Kenya, resident populations increased significantly during the 2011 crises – from already high levels. More than a quarter of a million Somali refugees arrived at the two camps in 2011 alone. The camps now host more than 600,000 Somali refugees, approximately 60% of whom are children. 

Providing education in the camps is particularly challenging given the chronic lack of services for the host populations in marginalised, drought-affected areas, where many refugees have settled. Many refugee children have had little or no previous access to formal education in Somalia, making it even more difficult to integrate them into the limited formal schooling in host communities. In Dollo Ado, only an estimated 15–20% of children are currently accessing education services.'

As well as East Africa, the report also discusses West Africa. Read the full report here.

The unintended consequences of free education?

Taken from Chris Blattman's blog:

From Guy Grossman and Evan Lieberman, this Ugandan New Vision article:

The day Government started paying tuition for all school going children, was the day parents ‘declared’ a holiday from taking care about their children’s education. What a shame.

Almost all school management committee became dull. Government stood at a distance and barked, but did not care to bite. Years down the road, the rot seems to be perforating its way through free education’s foundation in the country.

A decade down the road, Government is gradually realising that the parents stealthily put so much weight on its back, and this is gradually eating down the country’s quality of education.

And Evan’s two cents:

I’ve heard much the same thing from various head teachers in Kenya, absolutely lamenting the detrimental effects of free primary education (FPE)! The simple argument is that when parents don’t have to pay, they feel no stake in the school, no obligation to participate in management, and they simply delegate education to government. And because poor people in poor areas are not paying any kind of direct income tax, given low or non-existent incomes, they are not engaged in any type of fiscal contract. It’s pretty painful to think that in trying to provide universal primary education (and beyond) in these East African countries that the plan itself might actually be causing harm to the quality of learning.

The introduction of free education in Africa (or social security in Latin America) presents a short-lived opportunity to see the effect of government provision of education and other forms of welfare–relevant to US and European policy debates in this era of small government resurgence.

The laments of head teachers alone don’t convince me, but I would not be surprised if it were true. I pity that there are not (to my knowledge) studies taking advantage of the changes for a more rigorous answer.

Or are there? Reader suggestions welcome.

One of the most important things we can teach youth

Thanks to a comment on a LinkedIn discussion based on this blogpost, I was pointed in the direction of the work of Kiran Bir Sethi. It got me thinking about what it is that we should be teaching youth particularly in marginalised communities or refugee situations. They are surrounded by negativity of one form or another: stigma, being told they're not good enough, poverty, unrealised dreams. 

What then should we be teaching them? As Kiran suggests, the concept of: I can. Now we've all heard about positive thinking, but somehow we've all assumed this is something applicable to adult life, that kids somehow sail through easily without the doubts and negative thoughts creeping in. Kiran's ideas show how important 'I can' is in youth life and the impact it can have on their lives as well as - and arguably more importantly - that of the society at large, and the community in which they live. 

Here is a link to a TED talk in which Kiran explains the concept much more powerfully than I do. Well worth a watch, if only to see how the word 'infection' can be used in a positive context. 

Urban Refugees: an education

Did you guess the correct answer to this post? 

The approximate 7 million people I was referring to are urban refugees. Whilst the UN's Refugee Agency UNHCR estimates a total number of 10.5 million refugees worldwide, you might be surprised to learn that roughly two-thirds of these are in fact urban refugees.

Urban Refugees
What then is an urban refugee? An urban refugee is someone who like a refugee has fled their country due to reasons outlined in the UN Convention relating to the Status of Refugees - see here for an exact definition. How an urban refugee differs however is where the urban refugee lives - the clue is in the name. Rather than staying in a refugee camp, urban refugees instead live amongst the local community in the cities of the host country and attempt to - in some cases successfully - integrate and forge a new life in this way.

I've talked about education in refugee camp situations in previous posts, however how much do we actually know about the educational situation of urban refugees? Are they better off than those in refugee camps? 

As might be expected, keeping tabs on the numbers of urban refugees can be problematic, which in turn makes providing them with humanitarian assistance equally problematic. A refugee camp allows for categorisation and sorting of numbers, masses of people in various locations obviously does not.
Syria
The current crisis in Syria provides a relevant example, with Syrians fleeing the country into Jordan (said to be 40,000) and Turkey. Many of these refugees are urban refugees.  In terms of language, little differs between Jordan and Syria (apart from regional differences in Arabic). In Turkey this is not the case. Whilst Syria is a middle income country, given the nature of a refugee situation, it needs to be remembered that jobs remain elusive in the host country.

In terms of education, Jordan provides an interesting example. It currently plays host to Palestinian refugees as well as those from Syria. UNRWA (the UN agency for Palestinian refugees) provides education in camps for Palestinian refugees, however many of the refugees have access to government schools as well. If students are back in schooling however then the education is likely not to be catered to refugee needs. Curricula remain much the same, and refugees must integrate themselves into local school life.

One of the problems it seems is the lack of focus on education even in camp situations - these tend to be better documented in comparison with urban situations, thus highlighting the general little focus upon education in these circumstances. Although UNHCR's mandate now stretches to those outside of camps, it seems focus on education overall remains low. Regular readers of the blog know this is something I mention frequently. Of course if basic provisions cannot be met, then education cannot be given priority, however given that the Syrian situation shows no sign of improving in the near future, it seems Syrian youth would benefit from returning to a sense of 'normality'. 

So what can be done? 
From a distance the action we can take seems limited, however it is important to keep Syria at the forefront of our minds, not only as individuals but as the international community as a whole. The situation has been going on for far too long with the world seemingly standing by to watch it unfold. 

In light of the Syrian example, where does the responsibility lie? Who should ensure refugees - in particular those fleeing to urban centres - have the assistance they require, including education? Is it a risky business to start providing education? Does this simply prolong a refugee situation? How should the assistance provided to those in urban centres differ to that provided to encamped refugees?

Share your thoughts with other readers in the box below. 

Interested in Alternative Education?

In light of a previous post on changing education paradigms, the Education Revolution - Alternative Education Resource Organisation website proves an interesting resource on Alternative Education. It is a global network of innovators and resources such as links to information on homeschooling, Montessori schooling, and even job listings for those in the States. There are also a variety of articles on various aspects of Alternative Education.

Check out the website here. 

Was the current system of education designed for a different age?

One of the important questions Sir Ken Robinson answers in this must-watch video on Changing Education Paradigms.

Sir Ken Robinson suggests that children have been 'anaesthetised' to get through schooling, and instead we should be waking them up to discover what is inside of themselves. If this is the case then, the question is: at what stage do children learn what is inside themselves under the current education norms?

He also mentions that we need to go in the exact opposite direction of standardisation - I do agree, however struggle with how this plays out in practice. Is this why more and more people are turning towards homeschooling? Are schools currently stifling the critical - or divergent, as Sir Ken Robinson calls it - thinking abilities of children? It would be great to hear your thoughts.

Quick note: The video constantly refers to education, however I think that Sir Ken Robinson is talking about schooling. For more on the difference between schooling and education, take a look at this previous post. 

Madaar - volunteers needed!

Madaar - Open Islamic Curriculum is a project I am involved with, and we're currently looking for volunteers. If you have some time to spare - no matter how much - then get in touch, or please forward on to someone who might be interested.

Check out why you should help us here. For more about the project, take a look here. 

Progress for Children: putting secondary education in the spotlight

Taken from the UNICEF report Progress for Children - A report card on adolescents, the map below highlights the net enrolment/attendance ratio of adolescents worldwide (net enrolment accounting for students of the official secondary school age, rather than students of all ages). My areas of interest - Pakistan and East Africa - evidently have a lot of progress to make. 

'In many countries there is a drop-off in enrolment  between primary and lower secondary education, and between lower and upper secondary education. Particularly in sub-Saharan Africa, drop-off is high  between the primary and lower secondary levels.  Globally, the lower secondary gross enrolment rate  was 80 per cent in 2009, whereas the upper secondary gross enrolment rate was 56 per cent. 

[...] 

The gap in lower secondary school completion rates between sub-Saharan Africa and the rest of the world appears to be widening. In fact, sub-Saharan Africa has the worst secondary education indicators of any region: Its level of enrolment of secondary-school-aged children is the lowest, as are its rates of secondary school completion, and it has fewer girls enrolled than boys. 

Low secondary school enrolment stems in part from low primary school completion. In sub-Saharan Africa, only 47 per cent of 15–19-year-old girls and 52 per cent of 15–19-year-old boys have completed primary school (see Figure 3.3 for percentages in selected countries). 

The effective transition rate measures the probability that a student in the last grade of primary school will enrol in the first grade of secondary school. Many industrialized countries and many countries in CEE/CIS, the Middle East and North Africa, and Latin America and the Caribbean have primary-to-secondary school transition rates of nearly 90 per cent or above. In the least developed countries, three fourths of children who complete primary school make the transition to secondary school. 

Behind the regional averages, however, are wide  variations in primary-to-secondary school transition rates. In sub-Saharan Africa, rates range from as low as 36 per cent in the United Republic of Tanzania to as high as 98 per cent in Botswana. The transition rate does not reflect whether primary completion in the country is high or low, nor does it reflect such quality indicators as age in grade.'

Good to see a focus on adolescents, at a time of disproportionate attention given to primary education. The report explores adolescence in relation to various areas including education and work; sexual behaviour, maternal health, and HIV; and violence. You can read the full report here. 

An Overview: UNHCR Global Trends 2011

Today is World Refugee Day 2012 and it is also Refugee Week (18-24 June) in the UK. In light of this, and to continue to raise awareness of the importance of quality education in refugee situations, below are some key points from UNHCR's recently released Global Trends Report 2011. 

• In 2011, 700, 000 more people than in 2010 were receiving assistance from UNHCR (either as refugees or Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs)). 
• The total of those forcibly displaced worldwide was 42.5 million.  
• 7.1 million people were in protracted refugee situations (defined as 'one in which 25,000 or more refugees of the same nationality have been in exile for five years or longer in any given asylum country') by the end of 2011. This amounted to three quarters of the refugee population under UNHCR's protection (yet in some cases, education - particularly above primary level - is considered incompatible with refugee situations).
• Pakistan was host to the largest number of refugees worldwide (1.7 million) at the end of 2011.
• A concerning fact is that four-fifths of the world's refugees were hosted by developing countries - countries that often cannot achieve their own educational goals, therefore putting into perspective the educational struggles in refugee situations. However, it is perhaps important to note that in some cases refugees can be better off than the host community due to 'hand-outs' they get. 
• Importantly in terms of education, 46% of the world's refugees were under 18 at the end of 2011.
• The top five major source countries of refugees were Afghanistan, Iraq, Somalia, Sudan, and DRC.
• Voluntary repatriation remains the durable solution which has benefited the most refugees. The question needs to be asked if all of these repatriations have truly been voluntary however, or whether these refugees have had little choice e.g. because of camp closures. Also, in terms of education, the focus on repatriation can result in the reproduction of poor educational practice due to the focus upon using the home country curriculum.
  
  

Unless I've missed it, I couldn't see much mention of education in the report. To read the report in full, you can get it here.

P.S. If you're on Twitter, you can follow the blog @GEDBlog

Free resources from Madaar - Open Islamic Curriculum

Shameless plug for a project I'm involved in:

Lots of new resources being uploaded today - including Maths, Social Studies and Art - and many more to come in the future.

Check out all the goodness here. It's all free.

You can also follow us on Twitter: @MadaarProject

Report: Protecting Education from Attack

A recent report from the Global Coalition to Protect Education from Attack entitled Study on Field-based Programmatic Measures to Protect Education from Attack.

Protecting higher education from attack

'Attacks on higher education may occur in countries where there is not an ongoing armed conflict, but when 

national governments, opposition groups, or other non-state actors fail to respect the ‘neutrality’ of education. 

It is therefore worth considering responses to attacks on education beyond situations of armed conflict in countries 

in which education is repressed, polarized, or highly politicized. 

Attacks on academic staff can often 

occur for publishing research as well as undertaking teaching.  

The negative consequences of attacks on higher education affect not just universities, but also primary and 

secondary schools that depend on quality teachers trained at the tertiary level and on research that informs 

pedagogy and curriculum at all levels. Attacks on higher education institutions and personnel also cause a 

‘brain drain’ as threatened scholars flee or are killed, diminishing the quality of education overall. The situation 

for scholars in Iraq is an extreme example: over 460 Iraqi scholars have been assassinated from 2003 to 

December 2011. 

Many more have been kidnapped and their families targeted or threatened in great numbers,

leaving them with no option but to flee. 

 

Overall, those assisting higher education personnel indicate that they are assisting those that have fled from 

many countries in almost every region of the world. Scholars and academics who face persecution work in many 

different disciplines - sciences, social sciences, arts, and humanities - meaning that attacks on higher 

education are not always just about silencing the political opposition, but also about controlling ideas and knowledge in society.' 

The report takes a look at attacks on education from the perspective of: protection, prevention, advocacy, and monitoring and reporting. The end of the report provides several relevant country profiles. The sections on conflict sensitive policy and curriculum reform are worth reading. Check out the report here.

P.S. Did you know you can follow the blog on Twitter?

How important is the language of instruction in education?

Struggling in school is something that no doubt comes with the territory, all these new concepts flying around in your head – it’s meant to be a challenge. What is not meant to be the challenging element however is the language you’re taught in. 

The fact that it is hard to come by statistics highlighting the number of students learning in languages other than their mother-tongue, or in fact in their mother-tongue displays that the area remains a low priority for the international development community. Despite advocacy initiatives such as International Mother Language Day (celebrated on 21 February annually) many children continue to learn in this way – left little choice but to learn using ineffective models of the past. For example, Africa remains the most linguistically diverse region on the planet with the number of languages on the continent in the thousands. In terms of schooling however very few of these are utilised as the language of instruction (in part because many of these languages remain oral). Instead, colonial languages such as French or English are used. Although lingua francas, they are not the first language of the majority of speakers of these languages, meaning students struggle through their schooling years – if they complete the complete system at all – grappling with both new concepts in an unfamiliar language, when their primary concern should be the new concepts themselves.

To give some country examples, we can look at the research of Brock-Utne (2007) who highlights the postcolonial hangover in Tanzania. Evidence shows the negative impact of monolingual instruction upon learning – students engage in the simple accumulation of knowledge without critical consciousness, with pressure on teachers remaining high who maintain ‘safe talk’ when teaching in a language – such as English – other than their mother-tongue. Closed questions such as: Do you understand? resound in the classroom – hardly encouraging the response of no. The illusion of quality learning therefore remains, and students struggle through.

Pinnock (2009) of Save the Children UK is one of the researchers on the forefront of such issues and highlights that in multilingual societies where monolingual models are used high dropout rates are apparent as well as greater impact upon the society as a whole in terms of segregation and political instability (contrary to the belief that multilingual instruction would lead to such consequences). Repetition rates are evidently reduced with the bilingual model -  whereby the mother-tongue is used for instruction and supplemented with second language classes - as shown in Guatemala for example, where the repetition rate was highlighted to approximately halve in a study by Patrinos and Velez (1996) (World Bank).

The EFA goals have proposed quality education as one of the targets, therefore language needs to be considered – without this it needs to be recognised that the goals are likely to remain figments of the imagination; ideal concepts never to be achieved. Of course language alone cannot solve the problem, however it comprises a massive proportion of the element of quality which has entered the global rhetoric since the reiteration of the EFA goals in Dakar in 2000.

Perceptions of local languages are part of the problem – something which needs to be remedied as a matter of urgency. The impact of globalisation and the consequent growth and spread of English is partially at fault. However, it remains continually important to remind the international community that learning through English and learning it as a second language are two entirely different ball games. Of course it needs to be stated that doing away with all English taught programmes is also unlikely to be successful, rather contexts need to be examined, and most importantly learning outcomes of the students involved need to be analysed.

The emergence of networks such as the MTB-MLE Network highlights that focus on the importance of language of instruction for quality learning is growing, but more needs to be done if relevant, quality education is to be achieved. We need to move past the rhetoric to actually implement linguistic rights – it’s a huge task given that learning materials need to be changed, however if the rights documentation exists, the international community needs to be accountable for what is written in it. They cannot simply remain hollow promises. If action isn’t going to be taken, then the rights documents (which refer to the right of learning in mother-tongue) may as well not exist at all.

Some recommendations 

• Needs assessments with communities need to be carried out to determine attitudes towards local languages and feelings towards learning in English. 
• The link between quality education and relevant language needs to be established and used as a driving force to achieve goals such as EFA. 
• The importance of mother-tongue instruction needs to be mainstreamed i.e. not remain a minorities’ issue as it is at present. 

What do you think?

Do you have experience of implementing bilingual or multilingual models? Have you seen the side effects of learning in languages other than the mother-tongue? Do current advocacy campaigns oversimplify the practicalities of implementing mother-tongue/bilingual models? It'd be great to hear from you - share your comments and stories below.

You can also comment via Twitter: @GEDBlog

INEE's Minimum Standards Assessment Report 2012

Who: Inter-Agency Network for Education in Emergencies (INEE): 'an open, global network of practitioners and policy makers working together to ensure all persons the right to quality education and a safe learning environment in emergencies and post-crisis recovery'. To this end, INEE has the Minimum Standards Handbook which is the only global tool outlining the minimum level of educational quality in emergency and post-emergency situations. 

What: INEE recently released their Minimum Standards assessment report, which attempted 'to understand awareness of the INEE Minimum Standards (MS), how they are being used, and how they are institutionalized in plans and policies'. I'll cut to the chase and provide you with some of the main findings:

• Usage: Conflict is the most frequent context where the MS are used (32%), followed by Natural Disasters (24%).
• Awareness: Approximately 1 in 7 people report having limited understanding of the MS. 
• Training: National NGOs and people based at community levels state most often that trainings are inaccessible to them (in comparison to that received by UN Agency members, Education Coordinators).
• Advocacy: This is a primary use for the MS. 
• Coordination: The MS prove helpful with coordination in the field. 
• Programme Planning and Response: Written plans on using the MS are far from fully implemented in practice. 
• Research: The MS are also reaching academic realms and being used for research purposes. 
• Institutional Change: The MS have increased organisational capacity to prepare and respond to emergency education.
  
  

In light of the findings, some of the report's suggestions are:

• a more user-friendly format;
• simpler language;
• more realistic standards - possibly replacing 'Minimum Standards' with 'Quality Standards';
• greater guidance on how to contextualise the standards;
• more specific and measurable indicators to enable measurement of progress.
  
  

Having used the MS for research purposes, I tend to agree with suggestions that the standards need to be more realistic, specific, and allow for greater contextualisation. For further information on the assessment, and full details of the findings and recommendations, check out the full report.

What do you think?

Do you use INEE's MS in your line of work? Do you agree/disagree with the findings of the report? Do you think that general, global guidelines for Education in Emergencies are beneficial for successfully implementing the Right to Education in emergency and post-emergency contexts? Share your comments and experiences below!

Related Posts

Liked this post? Check out others related to Emergency Education here.

Say what?

Nice video (from Save the Children UK) following on from yesterday's post on languages of instruction.

International Mother Language Day 2012

Did you know today is International Mother Language Day?

Although the link between mother-tongue/bilingual/multilingual learning and a quality education is becoming increasingly acknowledged, it remains a neglected area in educational development. One of the barriers is the complexity of implementation (particularly in regions with multiple minority languages). The global appeal of learning through English as a medium of instruction - often confused with learning the English language - is also a very real barrier.

To find out more on the benefits of mother-tongue/multilingual models, MTB-MLE Network's website is a good place to start. Feel free to get in touch for further recommendations.