A new report, “Low Quality Education as a Poverty Trap” by the Social Policy Research Group at Stellenbosch University, has provided a troubling assessment of the quality of education available to children in South Africa. The study reports that by age eight, school children from the most affluent 20 percent of South Africa’s population were already far outperforming children from poorer families, showing stark distinctions between the prospects of children from poorer communities and those from more affluent communities at an early age.
The top 20 percent of state schools have adequate facilities and attract the best teachers, mostly because they charge tuition fees.
Has Sesame Street taken over Africa? Well, not quite. We previously introduced you to Nigerian program “Sesame Square,” which included an HIV-positive character named Kami. Now, a similar show has invaded millions of televisions in homes across Ethiopia, entertaining children while simultaneously educating them on things like sanitation and hygiene as well as the importance of culture and honesty.
Social activist Sanjit “Bunker” Roy is doing big things in India. He founded Barefoot College, an organization based in small village Tilonia, which aims to assist the estimated 41 percent of the Indian population living below the international poverty line. Local people are taught through peer-to-peer learning, passing on traditional skills and knowledge rather than having outside educators, and these people are trained as doctors, teachers, engineers, architects, designers, mechanics, communicators and accountants using simple technologies in innovative ways.
Sudan’s Omar al-Bashir ‘will not seek re-election’: Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir will not stand in the next presidential election due in four years, a ruling party official has said. The move is part of a package of reforms aimed at democratising the country, Rabie Abdelati said.
South Sudan minister says health is priority in Unity state: South Sudan’s minister of health visited Unity state, for the first time since his appointment last year, to assess what kinds of services are being delivered by the local state health ministries across South Sudan. Luka Monoja’s visit to Unity state is to show that health is a top priority for the government of South Sudan.
South Sudan Works to Rebuild Higher Education: Officials estimate that about twenty-five thousand students have registered at the five universities. Classes were supposed to start in April. But the Ministry for Higher Education in the south has now moved the opening date to the middle of May.
Audio slideshow on Sudan’s love of cows: For the Dinka people of Northern Bahr al-Ghazal state, cows take precedence over almost everything else. In the dry season, they have traditionally shared grazing lands with the Misseriya and the Rizzigat – Arab tribes from the north, who cross into the south with vast herds. But during the long years of war between north and south this migration was accompanied by violence, killing and rape.
Our staff photographer Morgana Wingard is on the road again — but this time, she’s in India with Still Life Projects, a documentary film company. This is her third blog post in her photo series.
Today we hosed down the mud-and-brick huts in the village of Kadamtolla, India. Not literally, of course. “Hosing it down” is our team’s slang for getting exhaustive video footage of the location. We were there to shoot a short film about 10-year-old Mangala, a student with big hopes of becoming a doctor or teacher.
Approximately 45 minutes outside the heart of Kolkata, the huts of Kadamtolla sit between a main road and flat, scenic farmland. Many children living in this area lack sufficient education because there are no schools nearby. So, last year, a local game-changer named Kali petitioned Kids with Destiny, the nonprofit that I’m working with, to build a school. Through a program called Project Rhino, they answered her plea. The response? Overwhelming.
Before even launching the program in Kadamtolla, number of children that showed up for the school far surpassed their capacity for the bamboo classroom that Kali constructed next to her home. They expected 30, but they got 120 wide-eyed children ready to learn, including Mangala. Children even marched over from neighboring communities.
Kadamtolla is testament to the need and desire for Indian children to receive education. Millennium Development Goal 2 aims to achieve universal primary education by 2015. Since 2001, 20 million children in India now have access to primary school education, putting it on track to reaching the target, thanks to US investments in programs like Project Rhino.
Stay tuned for the final cut of Mangala’s short film and Project Rhino’s story to be released at the end of March. Meanwhile, take a look at some of Still Life Project’s great photos below:
How do you transform a continent? Through investments in education, for one. And that’s exactly what Patrick Awuah, founder of Ashesi University in Ghana did. He started a liberal arts college for his people to help give Ghanaian youth the skills and motivation they need to become leaders.
Founder Awuah left his successful career in the US to return and promote progress in his native Africa. With a vision to “bring change in one generation,” Awuah started his school with a small class of 30 students and big dreams. Ashesi University in Ghana is a model for effective higher education in Africa. By teaching problem-solving skills in an African context, Ashesi is empowering its youth while fighting brain drain.
Students (who are often the first in their family or village to attend college) learn to adapt and apply the skills they learn to the realities of their surroundings. As a result, more than 95 percent of their 269 graduates stay in Africa to contribute to efficiency, transparency and progress in various private and NGO ventures.
Awuah believes that fostering ethical leadership requires more than passing new laws -– it requires a cultural change. By employing a rigorous honor code, along with community service and seminars, Ashesi teaches its students the significance of ethics, which is crucial in a continent where growth is stunted by corruption.
Photo courtesy of Ashesi University
In the predominantly rural communities of Africa, three out of four adults would not be able to read this blog post. There, in the most impoverished regions of the world, the link between literacy and poverty extends far beyond education. It impacts the ability for women to read prescription labels when caring for their ailing children or farmers trying to decipher the instructions for much-needed chemical packaging.
Since most adult students work during the day, their only option is night classes. As daylight dwindles, villagers are limited to about 15 minutes of actual learning time; the duration that the single kerosene classroom lantern hovers over their desks. Ironically, rural African teachers aren’t facing a shortage of enthusiastic students, but a lack of resources punctuated by limited to no electricity.
ONE is campaigning to ensure that the Congressional budget does not cut foreign assistance programs like Feed the Future that help people break the cycle of poverty and hunger.
The Horn of Africa is experiencing its worst drought in 60 years. More than 11 million people, mostly nomadic pastoralists and farmers in south-central Somalia, north-eastern Kenya, and south-eastern Ethiopia, are severely lacking access to food.
2011 marks 30 years since the first cases of AIDS were documented. Take a closer look at the specific, achievable goals we must hit by 2015 to make this year the beginning of the end of AIDS.
As aid agencies warn more than 9 million people could be affected by a food crisis in East Africa, world leaders are failing to keep their 2009 promises to tackle the causes of chronic hunger and support farmers in the world's poorest countries.
