Access to Education

1. Access to Education Amy Ko - Children’s Rights Pauline von MoltkePao - Poverty Danielle Cote – Child Labour Meghan Bruni – Gender Inequality

2. Teachable Areas • Social Studies, Math, Media Literacy, Drama, Language Arts • Character Development – Empathy • This unit designed for Grade 6 expectations but can be adapted for grades 5 and up

3. Why teach about Access to Education? • Awareness • Students develop an understanding of their connection to the global community • Inspire students to take action • Students will understand the interconnectedness of issues such as poverty, gender discrimination, children‘s rights and the role of government(s) • Introduces students to children’s rights

4. Minds On • http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i5QfcQZwROY • In pairs write 3 barriers to accessing education

5. Children’s Rights

6. What are children’s rights? • Children’s rights, listed in the United Nation Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC), are a set of universal entitlements for every child and young person below the age of 18. • The UNCRC itself is a legal document adopted by the United Nations in 1989. It grants children a comprehensive set of economic, social, cultural, civil and political rights. • The Convention is legally binding and obliges governments to protect the rights within it, however this is not always the case

7. Right to Education – UN Convention on the Rights of the Child • Article 28: (Right to education): • All children have the right to a primary education, which should be free. • Wealthy countries should help poorer countries achieve this right. • Discipline in schools should respect children’s dignity. • Young people should be encouraged to reach the highest level of education of which they are capable. • Article 29 (Goals of education): • Children’s education should develop each child’s personality, talents and abilities to the fullest. • It should encourage children to respect others, human rights and their own and other cultures. • It should also help them learn to live peacefully, protect the environment and respect other people

8. Right to Education • Inevitably, a lack of government support for the right to education hits the poorest, the hardest. • The right to education is an enabling right. Education creates the voice through which rights can be claimed and protected. • The right to education means that children not in school have been discriminated against and their rights have been violated.

9. What needs to be done? • Remove obstacles in the way of the right to education • Provide free and compulsory education for all children • Make education available, accessible, acceptable and adaptable • Teaching human rights for awareness and protection of the individual

10. To increase access to education, education must be:

11. Millennium Development Goal 2 - To achieve universal primary education • Target – Ensure that, by 2015, children everywhere, boys and girls alike, will be able to complete a full course of primary schooling. • In 1990, many countries pledged to achieve primary education for all children by the year 2000, however, the target was missed. • There are still 72 million children not in school. Most of these are in developing countries, and 40 per cent of them are girls. • In order to achieve this target by 2015, governments must ensure that all children are not only enrolling in primary school but completing their primary education as well. • Currently, only 52 out of 155 developing countries have achieved universal primary completion.

12. Poverty “Like slavery and apartheid, poverty is not natural. It is man-made and can be overcome and eradicated by the actions of human beings.” -Nelson Mandela

13. What is Poverty? • Poverty is: • not knowing where your next meal is coming from • not having a roof over your head • not being able to see a doctor • the death of a child from a preventable illness because you are unable to pay for medicine or clean water • not being able to read or go to school • being unemployed and having little chance of getting a job due to lack of training • powerlessness, lack of representation and freedom with no hope of change

14. Who are the Poor? • Children living in rural areas, women and girls, marginalized groups ( indigenous and displaced people) • 40% of all children in developing countries live in poverty, causing millions of children to miss out on school, be forced into child labour and continuing the cycle of poverty for future generations

15. The Negative Cycle of Poverty It is necessary to break this negative cycle to increase equity, access to education and reduce poverty How can the negative cycle be broken? Each country needs its own diagnosis and prescription to end poverty. Amongst the solutions, factors such as trade, aid, development of private sector and infrastructure, combating social disparities and disease and granting debt relief

16. Quality of Education • As noted in the UNCRC Article 29: All children have the right to a good quality education that develops their personalities and talents to the full. • A lack of quality in education, in combination with poverty, is more likely to cause a student to drop out than just poverty alone.

17. Canadian Poverty • 1 in 9 children in Canada, over a million, live below the poverty line • Many of these children are new immigrants or First Nations • Every month, 770,000 people in Canada use food banks. Forty percent of those relying on food banks are children.

18. First Nations Poverty in Canada • 1 in 4 Aboriginal children live in poverty • 45% of all First Nations people living on reserves are illiterate • High school graduation rates for First Nations children are half the Canadian rate • More than half of First Nations people are not employed. • This is the fastest growing population in Canada. If poverty is not addressed today, it will continue to negatively impact First Nations families for generations to come.

19. We Can Overcome Poverty! • “It’s quite possible to arrive in the year 2030 where people are no longer dying of poverty.” Jeffrey Sachs • Join Make Poverty History campaign to put pressure on the Canadian government to end poverty in Canada • Ask the Canadian government to make Canada a more equitable country by improving access to quality education and reducing poverty amongst First Nations people

20. Child Labour “The change starts within each one of us, and ends only when all children are free to be children” -Craig Kielburger

21. Definition of Child Labour • “Work that is done by children under the age of 15 (14 in some developing countries) which restricts or damages a child’s physical, emotional, intellectual, social and/or spiritual growth” (freethechildren.com) • Worst forms of child labour ( ILO) -slavery,trafficking, recruitment for armed conflict, sexual exploitation, illicit activities

22. The Factssource: UNICEF • There are 250 million children aged 5-14 in the labour force (16 out of every 100) • Everyday 80,000 children enter the world’s labour force • 73 million working children are under the age of ten • Every year 22, 000 children die in work related accidents • 8.4 million children are trapped in slavery, trafficking, debt bondage, prostitution, pornography and other illicit activities

23. Job Description • Some children are forced to work up to 18 hours a day, 7 days a week • Three quarters of child labourers work in hazardous environments (mines, factories with dangerous machinery or with dangerous substances) • Millions of girls work as domestic servants making them especially vulnerable to exploitation and abuse. • Many girls are also traded into the sex industry

24. Child Labour & Education • Poverty and gender biases result in social exclusion and discrimination, key factors that keep children out of school and force them to work • The MDG Report stated ”High rates of poverty in rural areas limit educational opportunities because of demands for child labour, low levels of parental education and lack of access to good quality schooling” • Education is the key tool in preventing child labour and exploitation

25. Child Labour – A Cause & Consequence of Poverty Child labour leads to a perpetual cycle of poverty and depresses the economy

26. Ending Child Labour • A study by the ILO found that it would cost $760 billion to end child labour, but the benefits to the economy would be more than six times that - an estimated $5.1 trillion in economies where child laborers are found

27. How to Prevent Child Labour • Access to free and compulsory education of good quality • Legislation to guarantee access to education and minimum age of employment • Awareness, activism, promoting fair trade • Replace child workers with adult workers and increasing adult wages • Measures to attract girls to school (adequate sanitation, girl friendly methodologies, vocational training in practical life skills) • Initiatives to attract higher numbers of woman teachers in rural and slum areas, in addition to male teacher training in girl-friendly pedagogical approaches

28. Canada’s International Response • Canada has signed on to the UN’s International Labor Organization’s treaties concerning the “Prohibition and Immediate Action for the Elimination of the Worst Forms of Child Labour” • Canada committed $15 million over five years to IPEC • Canada has supported other anti child labor projects in South America, Caribbean, Africa, Asia & the Middle East • Canadian International Development Agency – Action Plan on Child Protection • Promoting the elimination of child labour through labour cooperation agreements with it’s trading partners and through implementation of the Ottawa Declaration and Action Plan

29. Gender inequality and access to education

30. Gender Inequality & its implications • Gender inequality refers to the unequal treatment of males and females • Globally, this results in: • Fewer girls in school compared to boys • Subordination of women • Exploitation and abuse • Weak voice, lack of independence, oppression, marginalization • Unwanted pregnancy

31. Startling figures • According to UNICEF, in 2006, 93 million children were not in school. About 60 percent of them are girls. • In South Asia, men have twice as many years of schooling as women on average. • It is estimated that half of all women in Africa and the Arab region are still illiterate. • Lesson ideas: math worksheets; compare the number of students in the classroom to the number of girls who would not be in school.

32. Why educate girls? • Educating girls is essential to curbing poverty and promoting human, economic and social development. • Educating girls = lower fertility rates, financial independence, delayed age of marriage, lower child mortality. • Lesson ideas: Do you agree or disagree with these statements (eg: when a country prioritizes girls’ education, it is discriminating against boys); compare access to education in Canada with access in an African or South Asian country

33. Global reasons for gender inequality • Girls are less valued than boys in many cultures, and thus less heavily invested in • Girls are more often assigned the role of taking care of the home and children • Pregnancy • Gender stereotyping: the misperception that girls are less capable than boys at certain jobs

34. Gender Inequality in Canada • Women’s incomes are 61% that of men’s. • Thirty-five per cent of Canadian women have not completed high school and 72% of these women had median after-tax incomes under $13,786. • UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, Article 28: • “You have a right to an education. Discipline in schools should respect children’s human dignity. Primary education should be free. Wealthy countries should help poorer countries achieve this.”

35. Case Study Activity Get into groups of 5 or 6 at back tables