The State of the
Right to Education Worldwide
Reading this report
will make you angry.
It reveals how ill
fares the right to education today and exposes the hypocrisy whereby the right
to free and compulsory education is loudly and universally proclaimed, and
quietly and systematically betrayed.
Read the report. Get
angry. Help expose and oppose economic exclusion from
education.
Katarina Tomaševski,
1953-2006
Why don’t we have a global strategy for education? When is
education not free? What would it take to make it free? Why should we
care?
The State of the Right to Education
Worldwide
summarizes the shortcomings of global educational promises and examines how the
right to education fares globally. It highlights the abyss between the domestic
policies of wealthy creditor and donor governments which keep compulsory
education free, and their external policies which have made it for-fee.
The report
features:
¨
170 developing and transitioning countries divided into 6 geographical
regions
¨
31
tables highlighting the key findings derived from country-by-country
surveys
¨
6 global
blueprints for education
¨
A comparison
of international law versus global targets 1990-2005
¨
A synopsis of
differences between human rights law and global targets
It contains
disturbing statistics:
¨
In
Sub-Saharan Africa primary education is only really free in 3 countries; in 7
countries over 30% of children never even start
school.
¨
In
post-communist states (such as Eastern Europe or
¨
In
developing and transition states 35% of the cost of education is privately
funded; in industrialised countries the figure is 8%.
¨
Only 2%
of educational funds come from international aid.
It exposes
that:
¨
The right to education is taking a back seat to fiscal sustainability.
¨
Many governments and intergovernmental agencies are not committed to education as a human
right.
¨
The boundary between public and private education has been obliterated by
conditioning access to public school by payments.
¨
Charging for education which should be free is a global phenomenon.
¨
More than twenty different charges may be imposed in primary school.
¨
Resolve and resources are
required to realize the right to free and compulsory education.
It calls
for:
¨
Acknowledgement that the key problem
in ensuring universal education is not lack of public resources (as evidenced in
high and increasing military expenditures) but the global political will to
tackle economic exclusion from education.
¨
Reaffirmation of education as a
public responsibility and elimination of financial barriers so that all
children, no matter how poor they are, can go to
school.
¨
An end to
contradictory policies and institutional rivalries between global educational
organisations.
¨
A
realistic monitoring of the cost of education imposed on families and children
themselves, hidden behind the confusing vocabulary of ‘fee-free’ rather than
free education.
¨
Forms of
international cooperation that facilitate, rather than hinder, free and
compulsory education for all children.
¨
Immediate
and concerted prioritization of universal free and compulsory education so that
all children stay in education until the minimum age of employment – at least
14.
The report is Katarina
Tomaševski’s final call to action before her untimely death on 4 October 2006.
It should act as a wake up call to all those concerned with the right to
education, children’s rights and poverty reduction. You can read and interact
with the report at www.katarinatomasevski.com
For more information or
comments contact theteam@katarinatomasevski.com