Ecuador, a small country in South America known for its impressive biodiversity, boasts relatively equal enrollment rates by gender. Still, several barriers prevent many Ecuadorian girls from receiving the education that they deserve.

’10 Facts About Girls’ Education in Ecuador’ are presented below, exploring the biggest issues in girls’ education and efforts to improve girls’ education.

10 Facts About Girls’ Education in Ecuador

1. Enrollment in primary and secondary school is about even across genders. As of 2021, the ratio of girls to boys in primary school is 1.02, and as of 2020, the ratio of girls to boys in secondary school is also 1.02, meaning there are actually slightly more girls than boys in primary and secondary school (though not by a very significant margin). Meanwhile, in tertiary school (i.e. higher education), the ratio of girls to boys is 1.2 as of 2022, meaning there are significantly more girls than boys. These statistics exemplify overall parity between girls and boys in education.
2. While education levels are even overall, girls are underrepresented in the fields of Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM). Less than one-third of Ecuadorians who graduate in one of the above fields are female. Underrepresentation of women in STEM is a global trend and is clearly present in Ecuador. 
3. Despite pursuing education at rates at least as high as men, women in Ecuador are more likely to find themselves in vulnerable employment and are compensated less than men. Women earn 13-26% less than their male counterparts, and are 17% more likely to hold vulnerable jobs, meaning their employment is more tenuous. Thus, although women are educated at least as much as men, they still on the whole suffer more economically.
4. Overall, the rate of enrollment in Ecuador as of 2023 is 97% for primary school, 93% for secondary school, and as of 2022, 60% for tertiary school. Still, there is room for improvement in enrollment overall, and notably, enrollment in secondary school demonstrated a significant downward trend in the years leading up to 2023. 
5. Sexual and gender-based violence can unfortunately take place at school in Ecuador. In the decade leading up to 2024, there were 6,438 reported cases of sexual violence at schools, a number that is likely far below the actual number of sexual violence at schools. Obviously, sexual violence at school not only disables girls or any child from receiving an education but is also unbelievably traumatizing, resulting in much greater damage to victims’ lives. Though the Ecuadorian government launched multiple initiatives to try to curtail sexual violence in schools, sexual violence is still prevalent. Problems such as resistance to education on sexuality, lack of enforcement, and injustices in the judicial system have prevented the government from satisfactorily addressing the immense problem of sexual violence in schools, meaning this problem unfortunately still persists.
6. In Ecuador, 22% of girls are married before they turn 18 (as of 2018), despite a Civil Code reform enacted in 2015 that raised the legal age of marriage for girls from 12 to 18. Underaged brides often engage in domestic chores and other marital duties, including premature parenthood, in place of continuing their education. 
7. Early pregnancy can prevent girls from remaining in school. As of 2024, 5 girls aged 10-14 and 105 girls aged 15-19 give birth each day in Ecuador. When girls of a young age give birth, it burdens them with the immense responsibility of raising a child, which can prevent them from attending school and receiving an education.
8. Some progress has recently been made in reducing child pregnancy in Ecuador. From 2018-2025, a multilateral initiative called the Intersectoral Policy for the Prevention of Pregnancy in Girls and Adolescents (PIPENA) strove to provide adolescents with the necessary education and services to prevent pregnancy. The results have been significant, with the number of girls aged 10-14 giving birth decreasing from 2.6 to 2.3 per thousand and the number of girls aged 15-19 giving birth decreasing from 69.5 to 47.3, as of 2024. Hopefully, this decrease in child pregnancies will allow more girls to stay in school who otherwise would have dropped out.
9. Ecuador has made a commitment to stop early marriage by 2030. If this were to happen, it would allow many more girls to attend school rather than get married. While it is not clear exactly how much progress has been made towards this goal, between 2015 and 2020, the rate at which married women under the age of 18 gave birth dropped from over 5% to under 2%, which is a positive development.
10. Warmi STEM is an organization working to provide young Indigenous women in Ecuador with the opportunity to pursue careers in STEM. The organization puts a particular emphasis on fighting climate change, utilizing indigenous knowledge about nature as a foundation for their education of indigenous children. Warmi STEM combats the gender and indigenous gap in STEM, educating a new generation of climate-conscious scientists.

These 10 facts about girls’ education in Ecuador highlight the obstacles that stand between Ecuadorian girls and their education. While progress towards eliminating child marriage and sexual violence in schools has been limited, some progress has been made to reduce child pregnancies, and Warmi STEM is working to increase female and indigenous representation in STEM fields. Furthermore, girls are currently enrolled in all levels of schooling at rates that are at least as high as boys’ enrollment rates, indicating that girls have good opportunities to receive education in Ecuador.

– Shannon Mullery, Jackson Mayer
Photo: Flickr