Study: Mothers influence daughters' education more
Students of Mugoiri Girls High School in Muranga County in Nairobi after schools closed for Christmas break. A new report shows that mothers in low and middle-income countries influence their daughters to study more than their fathers.
What you need to know:
- Mothers in low and middle-income countries influence their daughters to study more than their fathers.
- Globally, as at 2018, there were nine million girls out of the 12 million primary school-age children who have never attended school.
- Women with disabilities tend to be particularly disadvantaged in access to education.
- Report recognises strong political commitment and activism as a gateway to promoting access to education for teens who are either pregnant or have delivered.
Mothers in low and middle-income countries influence their daughters to study more than their fathers.
This is according to new Global Education Monitoring Report (2020) by United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (Unesco) which looks into 25 years of efforts for gender equality in education.
For instance, an extra year of maternal education for girls born in the 1980s, leads to seven extra months of education for the girls.
Thus, the recommendation to implement policies minimising girls' inaccessibility to education such as creating quotas in tertiary enrolment for vulnerable groups, granting scholarships and cash transfers as well as removing user fees in primary education.
Role models
With this, the possibility of girls losing focus on education is reduced as they will have mothers are role models and anchors of their motivation.
Nevertheless, girls still continue to fall behind in education.
Globally, as at 2018, there were nine million girls out of the 12 million primary school-age children who have never attended school. And more than four million of those girls were in Sub-Saharan Africa, according to the report.
In the past 25 years, however, an increased number of girls have joined school.
Between 1995 and 2018, a total of 180 million more girls enrolled in primary and secondary schools, equivalent to a 55 per cent increase.
Gender stereotypes
But women with disabilities tend to be particularly disadvantaged in access to education.
It exemplifies Mozambique, where available data shows that 49 per cent of men with disabilities can read and write against 17 per cent, women.
Further, parents’ gender stereotypes can stand in the way of boys’ and girls' access to education.
"In Sokoto, Nigeria, some parents believe access to secondary school would prevent girls from marrying," states the report.
“In Fiji, parents expect boys to assist with cash crop farming, which can lead them to disengage with school," it further notes.
Political commitment
The report recognises strong political commitment and activism as a gateway to promoting access to education for teens who are either pregnant or have delivered.
In Argentina, for instance, a holistic approach combining two laws, flexible learning programmes, nurseries in schools, re-entry programmes for vulnerable children and non-formal alternative secondary education programmes has helped protect pregnant girls and young parents right to education.
In Sierra Leone, official policy in 2015 banned pregnant girls from school. But in 2019, the ban was lifted after the Court of Justice of the Economic Community of West African States found it to be discriminatory. This became possible due to strong activism against the policy.
