EFA Global Monitoring Report 2 0 1 3/4 TEACHING AND LEARNING: Achieving quality for all Monitoring the Education for All goals Progress towards the six Education for All goals in Sub-Saharan Africa Sub-Saharan Africa World Indicator 1999 2011 2011 Goal 1 Pre-primary gross enrolment ratio (%) 10 18 50 Goal 2 Primary net enrolment ratio (%) 58 77 89 Out-of-school children (million) 42.1 29.8 57.2 Goal 3 Lower secondary gross enrolment ratio (%) 29 49 82 Out-of-school adolescents (million) 22.2 21.8 69.4 Goal 4 Adult literacy rate* (%) 53 59 84 Youth literacy rate* (%) 66 70 89 Goal 5 Primary gender parity index 0.85 0.93 0.97 Secondary gender parity index 0.82 0.83 0.98 Goal 6 Primary pupil/teacher ratio 42 43 24 Finance Public education spending (% GNP) 4.0 5.0 5.1 (% total government expenditure) 17.1 18.7 15.5 * Progress on literacy is reported for the periods 1985/94 (left column) and 2005/11 (right column). Source: UIS database Despite progress, most EFA goals The pre-primary education gross enrolment are likely to be missed by 2015 ratio increased from 10% in 1999 to 18% in 2011 leaving the region lagging behind all Early childhood care and education others. Moreover, access to early childhood Early childhood outcomes have improved. education services remains unequal. Even The under-5 mortality rate fell from 156 in middle income countries with better deaths for every 1000 live births in 2000 to 97 coverage on average, such as Nigeria, SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA in 2012. Although sub-Saharan Africa is still there is a wide gap in access between the the region with the highest child mortality richest and poorest children: in 2011, only rate in the world, the rate of progress 10% of 3- to 4-year olds from the poorest reached 3.8% per year between 2000 and fifth of families attended some form of 2012, compared with 1.4% in the 1990s. organized early childhood education programme, compared to about 84% of their richest peers. United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization 2 2013/4 Education for All Global Monitoring Report Universal primary education there were only 83 girls enrolled for every 100 Sub-Saharan Africa is far from achieving boys in 2011. Of the 30 countries with fewer universal primary education with a than 90 girls for every 100 boys, 18 were in net enrolment ratio of 77%. This is an sub-Saharan Africa. improvement from 58% in 1999, but sub-Saharan Africa is the region lagging the Quality of education most as no progress has been made since In sub-Saharan Africa, pupil/teacher ratios 2007, leaving nearly 30 million children out stagnated and are among the highest in of school. Moreover, assessing whether the world. Of the 162 countries with data in universal primary education has been 2011, 26 had a pupil/teacher ratio in primary achieved should be based on measures of education exceeding 40:1; of these, 23 were completion rather than enrolment, which in sub-Saharan Africa. often gives a misleadingly optimistic picture. For example, Senegal had a net enrolment Monitoring global education targets ratio of 75% in 2010, but only 49% of children after 2015 of primary school starting age were expected The pace of progress towards Education for to complete primary school. All goals is too slow for many countries in the region, particularly for the disadvantaged. Youth and adult skills The gap between the amount of time the By 2011, the net enrolment ratio at lower poorest rural females and the richest urban secondary school reached 49%, but the males spent in school actually widened number of adolescents out of school in the between 2000 and 2010, from 6.9 years to region remained at 22 million between 1999 8.3 years. If recent trends continue, the and 2011, because of population growth. In richest boys will achieve universal primary general, many countries in sub-Saharan completion in 2021, but the poorest girls Africa have expanded access to lower will not catch up until 2086. Likewise, if secondary school, but it will take more time recent trends continue, girls from the and effort to translate these gains into higher poorest families in sub-Saharan Africa will completion rates. Moreover, wide inequalities only achieve universal lower secondary remain. For example, in Mozambique and completion in 2111, 64 years later than the the United Republic of Tanzania, almost boys from the richest families. Post-2015 no young women from the poorest families goals need to include a commitment to completed lower secondary school in make sure the most disadvantaged groups 2010/2011 whereas young men from the achieve benchmarks set for goals. Failure richest families more than tripled their to do so could mean that measurement of completion rates, to over 35%, between the progress continues to mask the fact that the late 1990s and 2010/2011. advantaged benefit the most. Trends in financing Education for All Adult literacy In sub-Saharan Africa, the number of New EFA goals after 2015 should set a illiterate adults has increased by 37% since target for all countries to allocate at least 1990, mainly due to population growth, 6% of GNP to education and at least 20% of reaching 182 million in 2011. By 2015, total government expenditure on education. it is projected that 26% of all illiterate Sub-Saharan Africa spent on average 5% adults will live in sub-Saharan Africa, up of GNP on education and 18.7% of total from 15% in 1990. government expenditure on education. While some countries in the region, such as Gender parity and equality Swaziland and Ghana, put more emphasis Sub-Saharan Africa has not achieved gender on education financing, for example, meeting parity. In primary education, there were 93 the benchmark on spending as a percentage girls for every 100 boys enrolled in 2011, of GNP, other countries, such as the Central compared to 85 girls for every 100 boys in African Republic and the Democratic 1999. In secondary education, there has Republic of the Congo, spend less than 3% barely been any progress since 1999 and of GNP to education. If the Central African Sub-Saharan Africa Sub-Saharan Africa • Teaching and Learning: Achieving quality for all 3 Supporting teachers to end the learning crisis Republic increased its tax-to-GDP ratio by The global learning crisis: 1.25% per year from 2011 onwards and if action is urgent the government ensured that 20% of the budget is allocated to education, then an Globally, 250 million children of primary additional US$ 66 million would be available school age are not learning the basics in for education in 2015, more than doubling reading and mathematics, whether they are expenditure per primary school child, from in school or not. In sub-Saharan Africa, over US$44 to US$95. half of children are not learning the basics in reading: a quarter of primary school aged Around the world, governments are grappling children reached grade four but still did not with ways to reallocate their education learn the basics, and over a third did not budgets to those children most in need. reach grade four. South Africa’s redistribution reforms have aimed to reverse the legacy of the apartheid There are wide disparities between countries’ schooling system by introducing a ‘no fee education systems: In both Kenya and schools’ policy. Under this policy, schools in Zambia, more than three-quarters of primary areas which ranked the lowest according to school age children make it beyond grade 4, income, unemployment and education level but while in Kenya 70% of these children are received a per student allocation that was six able to read, just 44% can in Zambia. times higher than the allocation to schools in the richest areas. Poverty can affect children’s ability to learn. In all 20 African countries included An increase in public spending needs to in the report’s analysis, children from take into account how the cost of education richer household are more likely not only is currently shared so that the poorest to complete school, but also to achieve a can benefit. Adopting a national accounts minimum level of learning once in school. approach to education, new analysis for this In 15 of these countries, no more than one Report shows that of the total secondary in five poor children reach the last grade education expenditure in Rwanda in 2011, for and learn the basics. In Kenya, children 2013/4 example, households covered 44%, donors have a better chance to learn, on average, 17% and the government 39%. This shows than others in the region, but there is a wide that, first, education is far from free and, gap between rich and poor in the country, second, that external assistance continues mainly because over half of those from poor to be very important for certain countries households drop out early, while only 16% in the region. from rich households do so. In Chad, only 2% of children from the poorest households Total aid to education in the region may have complete primary school and master the increased from US$2.8 billion in 2002-03 to basics, compared with 43% of those from US$4 billion in 2010 but fell by 8% to US$3.65 richest households. In Cameroon, three- billion in 2011. Total aid to basic education quarters of the rich achieve the basics fell by 7% in the region to US$1.76 billion in compared with just 18% of the poorest.