ESCAP HRD Newsletter No 11: Education for Youth at the Crossroads

United Nations ESCAP
HRD Section

FOURTH UNESCO-ACEID CONFERENCE

Education for Youth at the Crossroads

The theme for the Fourth UNESCO-ACEID International Conference on Education was Secondary Education and Youth at the Crossroads. The conference was held in Bangkok in November. Below are excerpts from a presentation by ESCAP on the subject. The article deals with two major issues concerning "access and equity" of education for youth in Asia and the Pacific: the prevailing inequitable access to available educational opportunities; and the nature and quality of existing education.

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From ESCAP HRD Newsletter No 11, December 1998

The "Unreached" Youth in Asia and the Pacific

The concept of "education as a human right" is well accepted today, particularly since the adoption of the World Declaration on Education for All in 1990, which elaborated this concept by noting that "every person--child, youth and adult--shall be able to benefit from educational opportunities designed to meet their basic learning needs... for basic education to be equitable, all children, youth and adults must be given the opportunity to achieve and maintain an acceptable level of learning."⁽¹⁾

Significant progress has been made since 1990 in the world and in the Asia-Pacific region toward the goal of "Education for All (EFA)". However, as the 1997 UNESCO report points out, "most of this progress has taken the form of increased enrolments of children in formal schooling."⁽²⁾ Many young people in the region today are thus left without being given a "second chance" to receive the most basic levels of education. Two of the three major education concerns expressed in the World Programme of Action for Youth to the Year 2000 and Beyond (WPA) thus relate to the issue of access to educational opportunities: the inability of many parents in developing countries to send their children to school because of local economic and social conditions; and the paucity of educational opportunities for the more disadvantaged sub-groups of youth.⁽³⁾

Two subgroups of youth, namely girls and young women, and rural youth, deserve special attention. Gender bias, which is deeply rooted in many societies of the region, has strong implications for girls and young women with regard to the accessibility of opportunities and participation in education. This is particularly salient in South Asia, as 75 percent of the world's illiterate people reside in the subregion, and literacy rates among youth and adult women in many of the countries are about half that of male counterparts. In addition, rural youth in Asia and the Pacific are one of the most disadvantaged sectors of the population as a result of the general situation found in the countryside, which is often characterized by illiteracy, poverty, and little participation in decision making processes. Young unskilled job-seekers comprise a major proportion of the rural-urban migrants in many developing countries, who are among the most vulnerable groups in the labour market.

Why is it though that education is inaccessible to so many young people in the region? We need to be cognizant of the fact that in many countries where access to basic education is still an issue, the lack of political will is an underlying major problem. It is a reality that despite all the commitments made for the achievement of EFA, political interest seems to point some regimes to the opposite direction.

Education as a source of polarization

Why is it then that education is considered as a human right and equitable access to it has to be ensured? The answer perhaps is that education is generally considered to function as a means of promoting equality. There is no doubt that literacy and basic education is a foundation for human resources development and is a critical means to alleviate poverty and enhance the general quality of life of the people. Education opens up avenues for communication that would otherwise be closed, expands personal choice and control over one's environment, and is necessary for the acquisition of many other skills. It gives people access to information through both print and electronic media, and equips them to cope better with work and family responsibilities. It strengthens their self-confidence to participate in community affairs and influence political issues. Education gives disadvantaged youth the tools they need to move from exclusion to full participation in their society. It provides girls and young women, who are traditionally marginalized from the mainstream of development, with the knowledge and skills to function on an equal basis with their male colleagues. All of these functions of education point to the promotion of equity in society through the empowerment of people.

In reality, however, education of today seems to also function as a source of inequality, accelerating polarization between the "haves" and the "have-nots". There are several reasons for this, particularly as it relates to youth in Asia and the Pacific:

1. Nature of the labour marker today: This has widened the gulf between the labour force with and without education, those who are "trainable" and those who are not from the view point of the employers. Also, the rapidly changing technology and thus changing demand for skills requires flexibility, which most likely requires education far beyond basic literacy and numeracy.

2. Nature of the existing formal education system: This may be critically reviewed in that it often pre-selects "elites" of society at a young age, which systematically divides the young people into "first class" and "second class" citizens. Not only does such a selection process function as a force of division among young people, it also inculcates in them a narrow range of possible avenues to "success" in life, including occupational options.

It maybe therefore concluded from the above, that while attainment of EFA by itself is a major challenge, we need to start reviewing the nature of existing education and its underlying values in order to ensure that future education for youth truly works to promote equity.

Education for equity and empowerment

What then can be done to attain the goal of EFA for youth and ensure the role of education to promote equity and democracy among young people in Asia and the Pacific? Reflections on the messages given by young people at several major regional and global meetings for youth convened in 1998 might give us some insights into this.⁽⁴⁾

1. Promotion of youth participation as creators and designers of education: This will help ensure that issues close to the heart of youth are incorporated in the formal curriculum and other educational means. The Braga Youth Action Plan, adopted at the Third Session of the World Youth Forum of the United Nations System (WYF), calls upon all youth, governments, and the international community to "empower young people via full and active participation and representation in all types of education." For example, at the ESCAP regional meeting for youth, young people, despite reservations expressed by government delegates, expressed their strong demand for such sex education and drug abuse prevention education for both students and parents.

2. Recognize and enhance the role of non-formal education and non-state actors: This will help expand the quantity and types of educational opportunities. The Braga Youth Action Plan calls on governments to "recognize and promote the importance of non-formal education, being integral to the full development of individuals and societies and as therefore being complementary to formal education." The youth representatives in Asia further expressed the need to "provide additional opportunities in non-formal education for the training of young people, not only for the world of work, but also for imparting life skills."

3. Knowledge and values imparted by education for youth should reflect principles of democracy and equity: This will help ensure that education for youth enables them to live their lives in a globalized world. The Braga Youth Action Plan calls on governments to "analyze and review their formal education policies to incorporate... global citizenship education, emphasizing universal concepts such as peace, human rights, intercultural understanding, environmental protection, sustainable development and gender equity." Education in the future should enable young people to liberate themselves --their ideas, values and options for careers. Training in such areas as independent thinking, effective communication, and consensus-building are essential elements for the preparation of young people for effective participation in public affairs.

Education is the key to establishing and reinforcing democracy and promoting effective leadership. This point brings us back to the "political disincentives for EFA" pointed out above. While democratic principles of governance would provide for the education of citizens, access to education may be denied precisely because of its "empowering" function. This unfortunate reality in some countries of the region needs to be seriously taken into account in order for the strategies of EFA to be successful.

Conclusion

As the representatives of the governments declared in 1996, the Mid-Decade-Year of "Education for All", "Education is empowerment. It is the key to establishing and reinforcing democracy, to development which is both sustainable and humane and to peace founded upon mutual respect and social justice."⁽⁵⁾ As all of us have observed in the recent political history of many countries of the region, at times in extremely dramatic ways, youth have been the primary force for democratization. Unfortunately, however, many youth in the region remain deprived of their right to education precisely because of the political agenda of certain groups in society that are against democracy. It would be impossible to hope for the achievement of EFA without appropriate recognition and strategies to tackle such reality. In order to attain the goal of equitable access to education for youth and also to ensure that education is indeed a means of reinforcing democracy and equity, we need to strive further in partnership with our young people in Asia and the Pacific.

1. World Conference on Education for All: Meeting Basic Learning Needs, 1990, Jomtien, Thailand. Final Report. New York, Interagency Commission, 1990.

2. Adult Education in a Polarizing World, EFA Forum Secretariat, UNESCO, Paris, 1997.

3. World Programme of Action for Youth to the Year 2000 and Beyond, New York, 16 October 1995. (E/1995/123), United Nations Economic and Social Council.

4. The Asia-Pacific Meeting of Youth Organizations in Preparations for the Third Session of the World Youth Forum, 27-29 May 1998, Bangkok, and The Third Session of the World Youth Forum, 28 July - 9 August 1998, Braga.

5. The Amman Affirmation. In: Education for All: Achieving the Goal, Final Report of the Mid-Decade Meeting of the International Consultative Forum on Education for All, Paris, UNESCO, 1996.

Background of the conference