Archive for category: Education

Information and stories on education.

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E-Learning Sudan Offers Education in Conflict

According to ReliefWeb, Sudan has the highest proportion of children not in school, with more than 70 percent of children not getting an education. In this time of war, where over one-third of schools are not suitable for educational instruction due to their lack of infrastructure and location, children are being forgotten. War Child Holland has stepped up to the plate to give these children easier access to education through E-Learning Sudan.

E-Learning Sudan is an interactive learning game that is accessed through the child’s tablet and provides the stability and structure that a school in Sudan cannot. The most important aspect is that it focuses on the child’s creativity through an entertainment platform. As it is a game, it prompts the child’s competitive side, while still educating them through a program that is flexible and simple and allows their skill level to progress.

To give even more acclaim to the program, during the Dutch Game Awards on September 30, 2015, War Child Holland won the Best Co-Production award in collaboration with Ahfad University in Khartoum, Dutch Research Institute TNO and Flavor (game developer).

War Child Holland is an independent and progressive global nongovernmental organization (NGO), devoting its funds towards a harmonious future for those children and youth affected by armed conflict. According to the Huffington Post, there was a large-scale trial run in operation until March 2015, which involved 600 children in 19 villages. It aimed to generate a body of research that would clarify the impact of the project and scale it up.

According to War Child Holland director Bernard Uyttendaele, the program began with three years of the mathematics curriculum and will be expanded to other subjects. “Designed for scale, the long-term aim of the project is to enable children to develop the necessary skills and knowledge to acquire a Certificate of Primary Education. Education provides children with the opportunity to shape their own future. Communities affected by conflict prioritize education. This promising project responds to this, providing quality education opportunities directly where they are needed,” he said.

There was a research study conducted in 2016 by Hester Stubbé and his team on the effectiveness that E-Learning Sudan has had on the children. Two pilot programs revealed that E-Learning Sudan increased mathematic ability significantly and maintained the children’s motivation to continue to learn. Overall, it proves how extensively beneficial such a program is for children in at-risk countries. According to the study, the game is designed so that “the students are helped to master each learning unit before proceeding to a more advanced learning task.”

The designers also asked children to submit drawings of their environment: clothes, food, animals, plants and family. From there, the game design was created with the cultural background in mind. This makes it easier and more familiar for the children to focus their energy on learning the mathematical concepts. E-Learning Sudan has the potential of transforming the way that education during disasters is delivered. UNICEF chose this project back in 2015 as one of the only five which would be showcased globally as an educational innovation project. Its partners are now all collaborating in the development of conduits to accomplish the promise that such an initiative has of supplying children with education in affected countries.

– Nicole Suárez

Photo: Flickr

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Good News About Quality Education in Kenya

In an attempt to increase quality education in Kenya, 90,000 teachers are set to be trained. Instructors are required to participate in a government-sponsored program that will boost learning in primary schools, according to the Global Partnership for Education (GPE).

Over the years, more and more students have had increased access to education in Kenya. As a result, the adult literacy rate is almost 80 percent whereas the regional average is 61 percent. There are still some hurdles to cross, however, as many students who attend school do not have basic reading skills upon completion. A large amount of data indicates that teacher quality contributes significantly to the learning of students, according to a report by the World Bank. It is for this reason that having trained teachers is just as important as access to education.

Around 30 percent of teachers in Kenya are untrained. The number continues to rise as the number of students attending schools increases. Fortunately, efforts are being made to ensure that teachers are well-qualified to suit the needs of their students. USAID has partnered with Kenya’s Ministry of Education (MOE) to improve education in the country. USAID and MOE are working to enhance the capabilities of the teachers and improve the reading skills of the students.

GPE and the World Bank are allocating funds to Kenya so that they are better able to train teachers and provide students with school supplies. The two organizations are granting roughly $85.5 million for the training of 90,000 teachers and $9.7 million of the grant is to be used for the distribution of math books to students. The distribution of math books helps to make school more engaging for the students. The books are colorful and attractive in nature, making them appealing to young students.

Anne Irungu, a teacher in Kenya, marvels at how much just having a textbook has changed her classroom, “…sometimes one book was shared between two or more pupils. Since they could not all move at the same pace, you would find them fighting over the book, and the books would get worn out,” she said. “Now that each pupil has his or her own book, they sit comfortably, they work comfortably, and there is no conflict.”

Having well-trained teachers is beneficial to everyone. Teachers would have access to more earnings because of their training and children would receive a quality education which would, in turn, increase their own earnings later in life and reduce economic inequality.

These factors have the potential to reduce poverty in Kenya. With grants and training, the necessary improvements for education in Kenya can be made which may potentially lead to long-lasting changes for the future.

– Dezanii Lewis

Photo: Flickr

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Education in Hong Kong: Problems and Solutions

Education in Hong Kong: Problems and Solutions

Similar to the British system, education in Hong Kong consists of a 9-year compulsory education for students aged six to 15. Before enrolling in university, most students complete 12 years of study at public or government-aided schools, which are generally free to attend. However, there also exists a private international school system that is in high demand in Hong Kong: the schools are highly competitive to enroll in and boast very high tuition and schooling fees.

The education system in Hong Kong ranks high, though there are a few evident problems. Experts claim that quite a few schools overly stress “reciting” material, which requires students to memorize information verbatim. Further, the “spoon-fed” teaching style does not allow for lively student debates or the promotion of critical thinking. There is a worry that the mechanical reciting and negative acceptance of learning materials will restrain potential creativity and imagination among students. Other major problems of the current education system include low enrolment rates in local universities as well as social and psychological problems among students due to high stress.

There are advantages of getting an education in Hong Kong: one is that the use of English is more popularized in Hong Kong, as compared to mainland China. However, with respect to the education itself, there is no major difference between schools in Hong Kong and mainland China.

The system of education in Hong Kong makes it quite difficult for local students in Hong Kong to connect with Chinese culture and mainland China. In addition, many teachers in Hong Kong are greatly influenced by Western education; thus, they are more likely to recognize the issues of freedom, democracy and human rights as opposed to strengthening their identities with the mainland region. At the moment, both primary and secondary schools in Hong Kong are encouraged by the central government of China to set up curriculums that include Chinese teaching and bilingual learning.

There have been 3,714 cultural exchange programs with nearly 60,000 participants from mainland China to Hong Kong and Macao from 2006 to 2010. Both the scale and quality of cultural exchange has grown in the past decade. The exchange programs that have been included in the education in Hong Kong encourage closing the culture gap between students of these regions.

As mentioned earlier, pressures of higher education in Hong Kong have led to increased stress among students. This is fuelled by a prevailing ideology among the Hong Kong society that nothing is achieved without attending university. More than 80,000 high school graduates compete for one of the 15,000 government-subsidized first-year university spots each year.

Greater efforts must be made to address the stress faced by students within the system of education in Hong Kong. At the moment, the Hong Kong Children and Youth Services helps those who have a tendency of violence. Its staff provides services in addition to speaking gently, listening to the youth and helping them process their thoughts with patience and empathy. The Hong Kong Youth and Children Education Center opened in 2013, offering self-sponsored services and free testing for kids of families in need. It facilitates would be capable of helping them recollect self-esteem, increase resilience and coping skills.

Education in Hong Kong is moving towards an advanced global education system while also placing efforts on fusing the cultures between mainland China and itself. Reasonable solutions and measures depend not only on efforts by the government, schools and society, but also relies on the interactions between teachers, students and their families.

– Xin Gao

Photo: Flickr

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How to Improve Education for Conflict Areas in Africa

education for conflict areasAreas of conflict have many negative effects on the citizens that inhabit those areas. One of those negative effects is the quality of education. Conflict areas in sub-Saharan Africa, where warfare is prevalent, have the highest numbers of child soldiers; 300,000 soldiers between the ages of 10 and 24 are risking their lives in armed conflicts around the world instead of getting the education that they need. Education for conflict areas should be one of the main focuses of sub-Saharan African countries.

A survey conducted by UNICEF polling in the Central African Republic, Uganda, Chad and Nigeria found that 50 percent of respondents reported that schools have been forced to shut down or been damaged due to war conflicts. Additionally, the survey also found that in Nigeria 76 percent reported disruption to education due to conflict. This percentage was even higher in Uganda where 89 percent reported disruption to education.

Damaged schools along with unsafe travel to class, absent teachers and children being forced into war are all factors disrupting students’ education. In the same UNICEF survey, half of the respondents said that education is vital to providing the skills and opportunities that are needed while also promoting peace.

Some ways to improve education for conflict areas in African countries are to involve and correlate U.N. agencies, non-government organizations and local governments to respond to conflicts and promote education. Another way to improve education in areas of conflict is to create programs that are youth led and that promote nonviolence and tolerance. By promoting peace to youths it will encourage students to get an education as well as teach them to promote peace for future generations.

The Global Partnership for Education (GPE) is a nonprofit dedicated to bettering education around the world. GPE has been developing programs for youths out of school, including programs for education for conflict areas. These programs include developing ways to identify the number of children out of school and understanding the main obstacle to education. GPE also conducts assessments to create strategies and plans to promote education within individual countries’ governments and to create a dialogue with local education groups. The dialogue between local education groups gives support to decisions on promoting education.

The Effective Support in Fragile and Conflict-affected States policy by the GPE along with its Guidelines for Accelerated Support in Emergency and Early Recovery Situations is one example of how GPE is directly helping conflict areas such as the Central African Republic. These two policies coordinate decisions about how to utilize resources in crisis settings. One technique for doing this is to shift those decisions to non-governmental providers so that people get direct service during acute crises.

– Deanna Wetmore

Photo: Flickr

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Misconceptions About Gender in Education

Misconceptions about gender in educationApproximately 115 million children of primary school age are not enrolled in school. Another 37 million African children will learn so little in school that attending may not be as advantageous as saving money or putting the children to work. However, education is paramount for improving the economic status of individuals and improving the social and economic standing of communities.

In general, the cost of attending public schools in developing nations is the responsibility of students, families and faculty. Books, supplies and teachers’ salaries are usually the responsibility of students’ families. Cost is only one reason for low school attendance.

Of the children not enrolled in schools, 53 percent are girls. In many cases, girls are denied schooling as a result of the misconceptions about gender in education which place less value on educating girls as opposed to educating boys. The belief centers on traditional gender roles which place more value on women in the home.

Some of the top barriers to education around the world include lack of funding, teachers, classrooms and materials as well as the exclusion of girls and children with disabilities. The reasons for these barriers differ across borders but there are explanations that blame the inequality on misconceptions about gender in education in terms of future success, wages and family planning.

The following facts have been determined to debunk common misconceptions about gender in education in developing nations:

  • Educated women and girls are less vulnerable to HIV as well as various forms of exploitation.
  • Each additional year of education mothers receive reduces child mortality by two percent.
  • Each additional year of schooling for women is associated with a 10 to 20 percent wage increase.
  • Women re-invest 90 percent of their income into their families

Studies have also shown successes in longer school weeks in countries like Colombia. Longer school weeks keep students occupied and prevent exposure to commonly risky situations. Improving access to education for girls has a vast economic impact which increases families’ ability to afford to send more children to school and allows parents to work longer.

This information has spurred initiatives to improve education worldwide specifically for young girls. One initiative is the Global Partnership for Education (GPE) whose top priority is ensuring access to complete and quality education for girls with the aim to increase the percentage of girls completing primary school from 74 percent to 84 percent by 2018.

There are several pieces of legislation that have been introduced that aim to improve education and economic status for women. These include the Protecting Girls’ Access to Education in Vulnerable Settings Act and the Reach Every Mother and Child Act.

The most recent success for legislative activism is the passing of the Reinforcing Education Accountability in Development Act that promotes universal access to basic education for children across the globe especially girls. These acts are reliant upon constituent action so it is important to contact congressional leaders to support them.

– Rebekah Korn

Photo: Flickr

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4 Reasons Why Women’s Education Leads To Less Poverty

4 Reasons Why Women's Education Leads To Less PovertyDr. Martin Luther King Jr. once said, “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” But the inverse can also be true. When a socially marginalized group gains access to rights and opportunities, it can benefit everyone around them. This statement holds true for women’s rights. History has proven that easy access to women’s education leads to less poverty. Here are four examples that support this claim.

Women’s education results in better family planning

Niger is not only one of the world’s poorest countries, but it boasts one of the world’s highest birth rates. Women from Niger each give birth to an average of 7.6 children. The country sees large families as a sign of power and wealth. But “it’s impossible to feed, educate and care for all these children in the short term,” according to the nation’s family planning division.

Niger developed Project Sawki to teach women about birth control, family planning and forced marriages. Their goal is to encourage smaller family sizes. Aid workers created this project to let women speak freely about their marriages and future. “Husband schools” also exist in Niger to teach men the benefits of family planning through educated women.

The BBC, reporting on Niger, concludes that, “Education appears to be the key to reducing the number of babies born.”

Countries that invest in schooling become richer and healthier

Women’s education leads to less poverty, but also to several other benefits. UNICEF studied how countries in Southeast Asia and Latin America changed by investing in women’s advancement. The investing countries found an increase in economic development, income per family and health. Human trafficking and child mortality rates for those same nations declined. By contrast, the countries in the study who did not invest in educating women were met with reduced income and slowed growth.

Female empowerment comes from female choices

The ultimate obstacle to women’s empowerment, according to The Guardian, is the culture they live in. Women not only contribute 70 percent of the world’s working hours, they also make up 70 percent of the world’s poor. The most limiting factor to a girl’s future can be the people closest to her. These limitations take the form of a neighbor shaming a school-attending girl, or a parent arranging a girl’s marriage. If women’s economic choices are tied to their families then they will have few tools in escaping poverty.

The World Bank supports gender equality in addition to poverty elimination. It does so by providing resources to impoverished women while promoting gender equality in the household. The result is large development payoffs in society.

Education, in general, leads to less poverty

The American Prospect (TAP) looks into the complications of integrating education into an anti-poverty initiative. It is certain that both men and women’s education leads to less poverty. However, TAP notes how education only fights poverty in places where economic returns are viable and achievable for those with higher learning. Workers require a context wherein they can be rewarded for their skills and can see the benefits of the growth they help create.

Job training improves the quality of workers for a global market, which allows poorer nations to benefit from their wealthy peers. Supporting women’s education will create the context where girls can improve their lives and improve the world at the same time.

In 2017, Congress introduced the Protecting Girls’ Access to Education in Vulnerable Settings act. Through providing women’s education, the United States can bring about the positive changes recorded, and predicted, by the BBC, UNICEF, The Guardian and The American Prospect. If you are an American citizen, you can support this bill at The Borgen Project’s website.

– Nick Edinger

Photo: Flickr

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U.S. Colleges Provide Education to Puerto Rican Students

Despite having occurred nearly two months ago, Hurricane Maria, a category five hurricane, wreaked havoc on Puerto Rico, with relief efforts unable to catch up with the severity of the storm. In the day after the storm, the entire island had lost power, five percent of the island had cell service and only 40 percent of gas stations were equipped with supplies. Forty-five days later, only 41 percent of the island has power, 92 percent has cell service and 84 percent of gas stations are up and running.

The catastrophic nature of the storm has also had implications for education. Three weeks after the storm, nearly half of all primary and secondary schools on the island remained closed. College students, too, have been displaced by the storm, making it impossible for them to gain access to education on the island. However, U.S. colleges have sought to ameliorate this problem by providing education to Puerto Rican students for the Spring 2018 semester.

In the immediate aftermath of Hurricane Maria, some students had already started classes by rerouting themselves to Florida, where tuition discounts were being offered to those whose home institutions were unable to reopen. For Puerto Rican and U.S. Virgin Islands students, the State University of New York system, which includes schools like Binghamton, Purchase and Geneseo, made the decision to reduce their tuition to the rate of New York state residents. Rather than pay nearly $40,000 a year to attend, student rates would be approximately $25,000, leaving more fluidity for family assets to go toward home reparation, water access, etc.

Other large U.S. universities have also offered to provide education to Puerto Rican students starting in the spring. Tulane University, Brown University, Cornell University and New York University each have opened their doors to students from Puerto Rico. New York University will provide 50 students with free tuition, housing, health insurance and a meal plan for the spring semester. Tulane opened its doors to Puerto Rican students tuition-free. Cornell offered up to 58 students from the University of Puerto Rico (UPR) free tuition, room and board. Finally, Brown University shared that they would offer similar amenities plus assistance with travel to students at UPR.

Liberal arts colleges, too, have offered Puerto Rican and U.S. Virgin Islands students the opportunity to attend for the spring semester. Amherst College—one of the top liberal arts colleges in the nation—has offered to cover tuition and fees, room and board, books, transportation, health insurance and students’ spring tuition at their home institutions. Though their program is similar to that offered by other institutions, Amherst’s is unique by paying the students’ home schools for their missed semesters so as not to financially detriment them, as well.

In looking to provide education to Puerto Ricans affected by Hurricane Maria, these programs will manage to accommodate a wide number of students who may otherwise not be able to gain access to education for the spring semester. With continued support to the island nation, by the end of the year, education to Puerto Rican students of all ages will be back on track.

– Emily Chazen

Photo: Flickr

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Indigenous Children and Education: Struggles Across the Globe

Indigenous Peoples make up 15 percent of the world’s poor and one-third of the world’s extremely rural poor. They are subject to land grabbing, intimidation, discrimination, displacement and violence, and children are particularly vulnerable. When it comes to Indigenous children and education, there are a plethora of struggles faced across the globe.

The list of barriers to educational attainment for Indigenous children includes the devaluation of their own teachings, knowledge and culture, the whitewashing of history and deeply entrenched institutional racism. Rural children often can’t reach schools because they are too far away, and supplies, textbooks and school fees can be too expensive for many families to afford. Even when Indigenous children do reach the classroom, their lessons are not typically taught in their language and their curriculum is not culturally sensitive. They face discrimination and harassment by fellow students and by their teachers.

Quechuan parents in Peru were surveyed regarding their children’s education, and many revealed that they wouldn’t even teach their children their mother tongue at home for fear of the ostracization they would face at school. This fear and disenfranchisement leads to disproportionately low enrollment rates and high dropout rates.

In Botswana, corporal punishment is acceptable in Tswana culture (one of the ethnic majorities) but not acceptable in Basarwa culture (one of the Indigenous ethnic minorities.) This has led to very high drop-out rates among the Basarwa, and today 77 percent of the Basarwa are illiterate.

In 2012, Indigenous students made up 4.8 percent of all students, which is double their relative proportion of the population. The Indigenous population is young and growing, leading to higher school enrollments. This comes with its own challenges. Connecting Indigenous children and education – quality, accessible education – requires teachers to work hard to respect Indigenous culture and incorporate it into their curriculum.

Schools must also provide other resources to Indigenous children. According to a report by The Conversation, “many (not all) Indigenous children are under stress (educationally, socially, emotionally) due to low income, family mobility, overcrowded homes, and poor health and disability.”

The Murri School in Queensland, Australia, partners with Aboriginal health services to provide family support and healthcare, as well as occupational therapy, to their Indigenous students. This holistic approach better meets the needs of Indigenous students and increases retention rates.

In 2006, Cambodia introduced bilingual education in five of its provinces, allowing Indigenous children to attend schools taught in their native language. This helped close the gap in the number of out-of-school Indigenous children. Also in 2006, Ethiopia introduced alternative educational programs (such as mobile schools, flexible learning environments, boarding schools and bilingual education) to its Afar and Somali regions. This also had a positive impact on Indigenous children and education.

In 2010, there were no Indigenous adolescents enrolled in university in Cameroon. At the primary and secondary level, birth registration cards were often required for enrollment, and Indigenous Peoples face many barriers to receiving identity cards and being properly registered. Additionally, the academic calendar did not align culturally with Indigenous Peoples such as the Baka. Children were kept out of school to work in the forests with their parents.

Indigenous Peoples developed a curriculum called ORA (Observe, Reflect, Act) tailored specifically toward young Baka children. It is culturally sensitive, hands-on and aligns with the agricultural calendar. It aims to teach Baka children to read, write and count.

While Indigenous children across the world face innumerable challenges in receiving a quality education, Indigenous-specific measures can remedy this. For Indigenous children around the globe, “the key to success is to nurture a positive sense of identity, to engage positive community leadership and to nurture high expectations relationships.”

– Olivia Bradley

Photo: Flickr

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Five Important Facts About Indigenous Education in Mexico


Indigenous communities make up 12.6 percent of Mexico’s total population. Despite their significant numbers, this population faces much higher rates of poverty, poorer health outcomes and lower life expectancies than their non-indigenous counterparts. As of 2015, 80.6 percent of indigenous peoples in Mexico lived in extreme poverty, and as a result, indigenous education in Mexico suffers.

Five Facts About Indigenous Education in Mexico

  1. Compared to national averages and non-indigenous outcomes, indigenous children in Mexico are severely disadvantaged. Only 27 percent of indigenous children in Mexico graduate from high school. The national illiteracy rate is 8.4 percent, but the illiteracy rate among indigenous peoples is 44 percent. Indigenous children are more likely than non-indigenous children to drop out of school, and indigenous girls are especially at risk of not completing their education.
  2. Some of the major obstacles to indigenous education in Mexico are the lack of schools in rural areas (where indigenous peoples are more likely to live), lower-quality teachers or teachers who reach burnout and overall poorer academic performance (measured by test scores and other achievements) due to the language barrier. Spanish is the typical language of instruction in schools in Mexico, despite the fact that it is often a second (or even third) language for indigenous children.
  3. The approach to indigenous education in Mexico has evolved over time. In 1978, Mexico created a General Department of Indigenous Education. In the 1980s, the general philosophy of indigenous education was “bilingual and bicultural.” However, this was only implemented in a handful of pilot programs and the development of primers in 40 of the most common indigenous languages. In the 1990s, the philosophy shifted to “bilingual and ” In 2001, the Federal Ministry of Education created a branch called Coordination in Intercultural Bilingual Education. Two laws have also enshrined the right to education for indigenous peoples – the Amendment on Indigenous Rights (2001) and the General Law on the Linguistic Rights of Indigenous Peoples (2003).
  4. The Compensatory Education Project, partnered with the World Bank, has supported the expansion of CONAFE (the National Council for Educational Development). CONAFE is at the forefront of improving indigenous education in Mexico. It provides educational services in rural areas and in indigenous communities. The expansion of CONAFE focuses specifically on its early child development programs, its school-based management programs and providing traveling tutors to schools with the lowest levels of academic performance.
  5. The southern state of Chiapas has the largest indigenous population in Mexico. Chiapas has become a success story in the realm of educational attainment for Indigenous Peoples in Mexico. It adopted the Chiapas-U.N. Agenda, which mandated that its social policies be guided by the U.N. Millennium Development Goals. As a result, between 2008 and 2010 Chiapas saw an increase in its literacy rates and enrollment rates. According to the UNDP, this policy change “provides a clear example that change is possible if governments, civil society and people are willing to embrace it.”

If the globe and Mexico continue such positive efforts, the indigenous nation of Mexico should see even more of an increase of educational success stories, services, and overall improvement of indigenous education.

– Olivia Bradley

Photo: Flickr

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What is the Relationship Between Poverty and Learning?


Poverty and learning are often talked about together, mostly because it is agreed upon that education is an avenue out of poverty. On an individual level, education can be the difference between a life below and a life above the poverty line. On a societal level, educating girls is seen as the closest thing to a silver bullet for eradicating poverty. Education can improve food security, improve health standards and improve gender equality. However, poverty impacts education just as much as education impacts poverty; poverty has a direct impact on a child’s ability to learn.

The Relationship Between Poverty and Learning

Poverty affects children on several levels, including physical, social-emotional and cognitive. According to the NIH, “the stresses of poverty lead to impaired learning ability in children from impoverished backgrounds.”

Physical

Children’s ability to concentrate is affected by poor nutrition and poor health. Additionally, prenatal drug use, environmental toxins and long-term exposure to stress and violence can impact physical health and cognitive ability before birth and are more common in low-income households.

Social-Emotional

Children living in poverty often see themselves as victims of a system, lacking their own autonomy or ability to make choices that actually affect their lives. This poor sense of agency affects their focus, initiative and engagement in the classroom.

Cognitive Development

Long-term exposure to stress hormones as a result of living in or near poverty, violence and trauma affects brain development. In particular, children living in poverty exhibit lower executive function (impulse control, emotional regulation, attention management, task prioritization, working memory, etc.) because their energy is focused on basic survival functions.

Limitations of Schools in Low-Income Areas

Schools located in lower-income areas have deficiencies that create their own barriers to learning for students. For example, even when tuition is free, there are other potentially prohibitive costs associated with attendance such as textbooks, school supplies, uniforms and transportation. Coupled with the loss of income from sending a child to school who could otherwise be working, there are distinct economic barriers to sending poorer children to school.

Schools in lower-income areas are also typically overcrowded and have limited resources and infrastructure. There are fewer books and computers to go around, and teachers may be unqualified to teach their subjects or may be burnt out from operating under prolonged resource strain.

Possible Solutions

There are many possible solutions for improving the relationship between poverty and learning. Incentives for qualified teachers to teach in low-income areas could be implemented. Disadvantaged schools could receive better resources and funding. More schools could be built in rural areas and better transportation to schools could be instituted. Funding and implementation for early-childhood programs for identified at-risk students could also go a long way toward improving learning outcomes for students living in poverty.

Education may be one of the keys to reducing and eradicating poverty, but only quality education, tailored to meet the unique needs of poor, malnourished and/or traumatized children will be truly effective in this and break the poverty/education cycle.

– Olivia Bradley

Photo: Flickr