Education

Back to Global Youth Policy - WPAY

Learn what governments commited to in 1995: The World Programme of Action for Youth on Education (A/RES/50/81)
A. Education

21. Although progress towards universal basic education, beginning with literacy, has been impressive in recent times, the number of illiterate people will continue to grow and many developing countries are likely to fall short of universal primary education by the year 2000. Three main concerns regarding current systems of education may be expressed. The first is the inability of many parents in developing countries to send their children to schools because of local economic and social conditions. The second concerns the paucity of educational opportunities for girls and young women, migrants, refugees, displaced persons, street children, indigenous youth minorities, young people in rural areas and young people with disabilities. The third concerns the quality of education, its relevance to employment and its usefulness in assisting young people in the transition to full adulthood, active citizenship and productive and gainful employment.

22. To encourage the development of educational and training systems more in line with the current and future needs of young people and their societies, it would be helpful to share experience and to investigate alternative arrangements, such as informal arrangements for the provision of basic literacy, job skills training and lifelong education.

23. Opportunities for young people to pursue advanced or university education, engage in research or be trained for self-employment should be expanded in developing countries. Given the economic problems faced by such countries and the inadequacy of international assistance in this area, it is difficult to provide appropriate training for all young people, even though they are a country’s chief economic asset.

24. Governments, intergovernmental and non-governmental organizations are called upon to assist young people from developing countries to obtain education and training at all levels in developed as well as in developing countries, as well as to participate in mutual academic exchanges among developing countries.

Proposals for action

1. Improving the level of basic education, skill training and literacy among youth

25. Priority should be given to achieving the goal of ensuring basic education for all (beginning with literacy), mobilizing for that purpose all channels, agents and forms of education and training, in line with the concept of lifelong education. Special emphasis should also be given to the reform of education content and curricula, especially curricula that reinforce traditional female roles which deny women opportunities for full and equal partnership in society, at all levels, focusing on scientific literacy, moral values and learning of skills, adapted to the changing environment and to life in multi-ethnic and multi-cultural societies. The importance of the development of information skills, that is skills for researching, accessing and using information, and informatics should be emphasized along with the importance of distance education. Non-governmental youth organizations and educational organizations should develop youth-to-youth programmes for basic education, skills training and literacy. Consideration should be given to developing programmes enabling retired and elderly people to teach literacy to young people. Particular attention should be given to specific groups of youth in distressed circumstances, including indigenous, migrant and refugee youth, displaced persons, street children and poor youth in urban and rural areas, as well as to special problems, including literacy problems, for blind youth and youth with other disabilities.

2. Cultural heritage and contemporary patterns of society

26. Governments should establish or strengthen programmes to educate young people in the cultural heritage of their own and other societies and the world. Governments should institute, in cooperation with non-governmental youth organizations, travel and exchange programmes and youth camps to help youth understand cultural diversity at both the national and international levels, develop intercultural learning skills and participate in the preservation of the cultural heritage of their own and other societies and the world around them. The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, in cooperation with interested Governments and non-governmental organizations, is requested to expand international programmes, such as youth camps, by which young people, particularly those from developing countries, with different cultures, may help restore major international cultural sites and engage in other cultural activities.

3. Promoting mutual respect and understanding and the ideals of peace, solidarity and tolerance among youth

27. Programmes aimed at learning peacemaking and conflict resolution should be encouraged and designed by Governments and educational institutions for introduction to schools at all levels. Children and youth should be informed of cultural differences in their own societies and given opportunities to learn about different cultures as well as tolerance and mutual respect for cultural and religious diversity. Governments and educational institutions should formulate and implement educational programmes which promote and strengthen respect for all human rights and fundamental freedoms and enhance the values of peace, solidarity, tolerance, responsibility and respect for the diversity and rights of others.

4. Vocational and professional training

28. Governments and educational institutions, in cooperation with regional and international organizations, could establish or enhance vocational and technical training relevant to current and prospective employment conditions. Youth must be given the opportunity to access vocational and professional training and apprenticeship programmes that help them acquire entry-level jobs with growth opportunities and the ability to adjust to changes in labour demand.

5. Promoting human rights education

29. Governments should ensure that the United Nations Decade for Human Rights Education, which began in 1995, is adequately observed in schools and educational institutions. In order to make youth aware of their civil, cultural, economic, political and social rights, as well their societal responsibilities, and in order to develop harmonious inter-community relations, mutual tolerance and respect, equality between women and men, and tolerance for diversity, Governments should develop human rights education strategies targeted at youth, taking particular account of the human rights of women.

6. Training for enterprise programmes

30. Governments, in cooperation with regional and international organizations, should formulate model training programmes for youth in individual and cooperative enterprises. They are encouraged to establish self-contained enterprise centres where young people may plan and test their enterprise venture concepts.

7. Infrastructure for training youth workers and youth leaders

31. Governments should assess the adequacy of facilities and programmes to train youth workers and youth leaders, including the adequacy of curricula and staff resources. On the basis of such assessments, Governments should plan and implement relevant training programmes. Non-governmental youth organizations should be encouraged and assisted in formulating and disseminating model training courses for use by member organizations.

32. Interested organizations should investigate possibilities of strengthening international youth worker and youth leadership training, with priority given to accepting participants from developing countries. In cooperation with concerned organizations that provide training opportunities for youth, including internships and volunteer programmes, establishment of an inventory of such programmes could also be explored.

World Youth Report 2005: Education

2. Education

19. Since 1995, the number of young people completing primary school has continued to increase. Secondary school gross enrolments on a global level increased from 56 to 78 per cent in the last decade.7 Also, tertiary enrolment rates increased worldwide from 69 million in 1990 to 88 million in 1997, with the largest growth achieved in developing countries.8 Some countries even doubled net enrolment rates between 1990 and the beginning of the new century. The current generation of young people is the best educated ever.

20. Unfortunately, not all countries have been successful in providing education to their young people. A few countries witnessed contraction in enrolment during the 1990s, followed by only moderate increases since 2000. In some countries with economies in transition, primary education is regressing, indicating that achieving primary education for all is tied to socio-economic circumstances. Despite the progress achieved, 113 million primary school-age children were not in school in 2000.9 These children will become the next generation of illiterate youth, replacing the current group of an estimated 130 million.

21. Poverty is a major barrier to schooling. When poor parents need to make a choice, girls tend to be excluded first from attending school. The gap between male and female literacy rates in Asia and Africa appears to be widening. The greatest gender inequalities exist in the region of Western Asia and North Africa, where educationally deprived girls outnumber boys by almost 3 to 1.10 In the East Asia and Pacific region, gender equality in access to education is almost equal, whereas in Latin America and the Caribbean, there appears to be a slight bias against boys. In rural areas, young people have less access to education, the quality of education is poorer and adult illiteracy is higher.

22. Apart from making education available to all, emphasis should be focused on enhancing the quality of education. Abolition of school fees has stimulated school enrolment but can have negative implications for the quality of education. Experience in some countries in sub-Saharan Africa proves that without additional funding for qualified teachers and material resources, schools are not able to accommodate the larger numbers of students who have increasingly enrolled. Teachers and trainers in many parts of the world lack sufficient training, resources, support, materials and conditions conducive to service, which decreases the effectiveness of young people's learning.

23. Globalization and the technological revolution, complicated by growing global inequalities, require new responses to the educational needs of youth. Educational curricula do not always adequately prepare youth to meet the demands of the labour market. It has been estimated that roughly 10 to 20 per cent of the learning needs of the general population in developed countries are not adequately met by current formal learning systems.11 Developing countries face major challenges in introducing new information and communication technologies in the educational system. Urgent attention is needed to prevent the digital divide between developed and developing countries from widening in the next generation.

24. Education has long been regarded as the primary solution to poverty. The World Declaration on Education for All, launched in Jomtien, Thailand, in 1990, established the commitment of the international community to universalize primary education and massively reduce illiteracy before the end of the decade. The World Programme of Action for Youth adopted education as the first of 10 priority areas for youth development. The Dakar Framework for Action, adopted at the World Education Forum in 2000, identified six major goals for education, two of which became Millennium Development Goals later that year: (a) to ensure that by 2015, all children will be able to complete a full course of primary schooling; and (b) to eliminate gender disparity in primary and secondary education, preferably by 2005, and in all levels of education by no later than 2015.

25. In addition, international efforts have been targeted mainly at the education of girls and young women. A number of major international projects and activities are focusing on strategies for achieving the Millennium Development Goals. The Millennium Project, launched by the United Nations Secretary-General, has specific task forces focusing on education. In 2002, the World Bank launched the fast-track initiative to provide quick and incremental technical and financial support to countries that have policies in place but are not on track to achieve universal primary education by 2015. Nine flagship inter-agency programmes were put in place by UNESCO. Although there have been some positive developments in financing basic education, both bilateral and multilateral aid to education decreased between 1998/99 and 2000/01. The current level of international assistance to basic education appears to be insufficient to reach universal primary education by 2015.

26. Most States have included the right to education in their constitutions. Ultimately, progress depends on the extent to which these rights and commitments translate into enforceable legislation and well-conceived policies, plans and programmes. The Dakar Framework for Action requests States to develop or strengthen national action plans, which are integrated into wider poverty reduction and development frameworks.12 Many Governments are setting specific national education goals, including gender-related targets. Over the past decade, NGOs have increasingly campaigned for education and contributed to its delivery to millions of young people.

27. In the past decade, there has been growing emphasis on "life competencies" within the educational system. The introduction of such concepts as informal learning, lifelong learning, distance education, e-learning, peer education and training on the job show that the concept of education increasingly expands to forms outside the classroom. It is important that efforts be made to reach youth and young adults who have dropped out of the educational system before acquiring basic literacy and numeracy skills to enhance their employability. Reporting countries also described programmes against racism and violence and promoting multicultural values and tolerance, as well as programmes aimed at educating youth in their native languages.

28. Efforts should be made to continue the positive trend towards achieving gender equality within the educational system and, subsequently, in employment. There is evidence that educated girls are better able to make decisions that reduce poverty in their own lives and those of their children. Public policy measures that have proved successful and should be promoted include: creating an enabling environment for promoting female education through legislative and policy reform; redistributing resources to meet girls' specific educational needs; reforming curricula; providing incentives to families to make sending children to school a worthwhile proposition; increasing the number of educational facilities in underserved areas; improving teacher training; confronting violence; working with parents; providing school meal programmes; increasing the presence of female teachers; providing separate sanitation facilities for girls; providing school-based health education; and raising the minimum age of marriage. Such interventions require a strong public commitment from the State, albeit with the support of other non-State actors.

29. The importance of teachers and trainers should be recognized in the context of attaining quality education for all. Attention should be given to the education of teachers and their working conditions, career paths and wages that would make the profession more attractive.

30. Governments are encouraged to introduce and/or implement systems for validation of informal learning for young people. This would recognize knowledge and experience gained outside the classroom and demonstrate the correlation between formal and informal learning.

Footnotes:

7. See UNESCO, "Global monitoring report on education for all", in Quality Education for All Young People: Challenges, Trends and Priorities (Paris, 2004).
8. See UNESCO, The Leap to Equality: Gender and Education for All, EFA Global Monitoring Report 2003/04 (Paris, 2003). Entrance into tertiary education increased by 50 per cent in developing countries between 1990 and 1997 (from 29 million to 43.4 million), while the increase in developed countries was much slower (up 13 per cent, from 39.5 million to 44.8 million); 1997 is the last year for which worldwide data are available and comparable to earlier statistics. Since 1997, different categories for the International Standard Classification of Education are being used, affecting comparability of statistics for secondary and tertiary education.
9. See UNESCO, "Education for all, year 2000 assessment", in United Nations, World Youth Report 2003: The Global Situation of Young People (United Nations publication, Sales No. 03.IV.7).
10. "Severely educationally deprived" refers to children between 7 and 18 years old who lack any primary or secondary school education, that is, they have never gone to school. See Gordon et al., op. cit.
11. See UNESCO, op. cit.
12. See "Education for all: meeting our collective commitments", adopted by the World Education Forum, Dakar, Senegal, 26-28 April 2000.