Email Gambia News to a friend
Print version
Comment on This Gambia News

Gambia News : Politicians Should Go Back to School

The 2008 Global Week of Action, an annual event promoted by the Global Campaign for Education (GCE), is this year targeting politicians. In the Gambia, the event is being organized by the Education For All Campaign Network, which intends to invite as many politicians as possible to go back to school so that they can learn about the importance of Education For All (EFA), and about reaching out to those excluded from education.

The Global Action Week, 2008, calls for an end to all forms of exclusion from quality education. In order to ensure that Education for All is truly achieved, the challenge is not merely to guarantee universal access to education but equally to ensure that the education provided is of good quality.

Since the Global Week of Action started, more than 30 million more children have entered school gates and remained in the school gates. The number of children out of school, globally, is now down to 80 million and illiterate adults to 800 million. Some poor countries have dropped school fees and in The Gambia, the Girls Education Programme being implemented by government and its' partners, have increased access, retention, performance of girls in schools. Some rich countries have given more aid directly to education in poor countries. Other governments have shown political will, by making public statements on education. But progress is still way off target for the EFA goals to be met. This year, 2008, is the mid-way point for the achievement of the EFA goals. All children must have started school in 2009 if they are to receive a basic education by 2015. It is also 60 years after the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UHDR). Article 26 of the UDHR states that everyone has the right to education and that Basic Education shall be free and compulsory.

The Education for All goals, agreed in Dakar in April 2000, are:

Goal 1 - Expand early childhood care and education

Goal 2 - Provide free and compulsory primary education for all

Goal 3 - Promote learning and skills for young people and adults

Goal 4 - Increase adult literacy by 50 per cent

Goal 5 - Achieve gender parity by 2005, gender equality by 2015

Goal 6 - Improve the quality of education

The Global Campaign for Education and EFANET is calling for governments in developing countries to:

- Develop cost ten-year strategies for the achievement of the full Education for All agenda by 2015.

- Ensure that 20% of national budgets and 6% GNI are allocated to education.

- Ensure that 3% of Education Budgets are allocated to Adult and Non-Formal Education.

- Include specific measures to reach marginalised and excluded learners.

- Introduce policies and practices to achieve gender equality in education.

Abolish all fees and charges in education

- Include specific measures to improve quality of education

Whilst some of these measures have already been achieved in The Gambia, there are still gaps and children and adults are being excluded from education.