Real world issue (Lack of Education) — what and why?
- Teo Wei Suen
- Nov 11, 2019
- 4 min read
Updated: Nov 15, 2019
Today, education continues to be an insurmountable right for many children all over the world. Education is a basic human right, but at least 70 million children of primary education age are not studying and at least 750 million adults are uneducated and ill-equipped with the knowledge to ameliorate their living condition and those of their children. In many developing countries, access to education is restricted by a diversity of factors. These include gender roles, language barriers and reliance on child labour.
According to the Global Partnership for Education (GPE), only a small 20% of help for education are channeled to low-income countries. However, developing countries are not able to rely merely on their own financing for education, it is insufficient for countries to come up with an education system for every child — there must be a need for more foreign aid. Equitably, due to the lack of financial resources, the quality of teaching is lowered as there are insufficient financial resources required to establish schools, supply teaching materials as well as to recruit and train teachers. One of the consequences led from these problems is the oversized classes where various levels of education are forced together which does not grant each and every student the full benefit from an education catered to their own abilities and needs. Because of this, the percentage of drop-outs and education failure remains soaring high.
In addition, poverty is one of the factors leading to the lack of education. Effects of poverty such as illnesses, illiteracy of parents and unemployment would have easily doubled the probability of drop-out and non-schooling rate of one child. This is because a myriad of children are compelled to disregard their education as they have to work and give financial support for their family or deal with health problems related to malnutrition. The most affected area is Sub-Saharan Africa where over 30 million primary aged children remain uneducated. Eastern and Central Asia are also afflicted with 27 million uneducated children. Due to the deprivation of education and schooling or when children drop-out of school without attaining the basics, it will cause detrimental effects on the country's social and economic development.
One of the reasons of why children are not exposed to education is due to gender. Education of girls is in jeopardy with over 130 million uneducated young women all over the world. Also, one in three girls in developing countries marries before the age of 18, and they usually drop out of school when they marry. Again, poverty necessitate families to decide which child to send to school — often, females do not get to as they believe that it is less beneficial in educating a girl as compared to a boy. Rather, females are forced into marriage and become stay home mothers to look after their children and do household chores.
As I was researching on this topic, the weight of my own privilege collapsed on me like a stack of bricks. Unbeknownst to me, I was suddenly stripped of with invisible privileges that I formerly took for granted. Being raised in Singapore is a huge privilege as everyone is given the opportunity to study. According to the Compulsory Education Act 2000, a child who is a Singapore citizen born after 1 January 1996 has to complete the 6-year primary school education unless they fell into the exempted class which include special needs children. Parents who fail to comply will be subjected to penalties and could be easily fined up to S$5,000 or jailed for a maximum duration of 12 months, or both. In addition, starting from 2019, attending school is mandatory for special needs children (except for patients with moderate to severe needs) who are six years old and above and below 15 years old.
The purpose of introducing this compulsory education (CE) is to allow children to develop a sense of national identity and to equip them for the knowledge-based economy. While parents are mainly responsible for making sure that their children go to school, the Government is also responsible for providing school places and learning opportunities for every Singaporean children.
I also had the opportunity to volunteer at the Singapore Boys' Home (SBH) with some of my elective mates, and I got to sit in one of the sharing sessions with the regular volunteer there. Being a juvenile residential home, the SBH provides care and rehabilitation for boys between the ages seven to 16 and houses about 380 youths. These youths might have committed offences such as theft, robbery, rioting, molestation or judged to be beyond parental control. They also provide a regimen of academic classes combined with physical exercises for the boys. As we toured around the SBH, we saw basketball courts, study rooms and science labs catered specially for them. And I believe because education and the availability of resources to support learning was readily offered to them, in the year 2018, 100% of the youths who took N-level were 100% eligible for ITE with 2 or more 'N' passes. Additionally, 100% of the youths who took O-level qualified for Polytechnic and Millennia Institute.
Based on this experience, I changed the way I view Singapore's education system and not take it for granted.
Word count: 890 words
References:
1. Humanium. (2019). Right to Education : Situation around the world - Humanium. [online] Available at: https://www.humanium.org/en/right-to-education/ [Accessed 1 Nov. 2019].
2. Global Citizen. (2019). 10 Barriers to Education Around the World. [online] Available at: https://www.globalcitizen.org/en/content/10-barriers-to-education-around-the-world-2/ [Accessed 1 Nov. 2019].Republic of Singapore. Government gazette. Acts Supplement. (2000, October 27).
3. The Compulsory Education Act 2000 (Act 27 of 2000). Singapore: Government Printers. Call no.: RSING 348.5957 SGGAS; Republic of Singapore. Government gazette. Subsidiary Legislation Supplement. (2002, June 15). The Compulsory Education Act (Commencement) Notification, 2002. (S 329/2002, p. 2668). Singapore: Government Printers. Call no.: RSING 348.5957 SGGSLSGov.sg. (2019). News. [online] Available at: https://www.gov.sg/news/content/channel-newsasia---compulsory-education-for-all-special-needs-children-from-2019 [Accessed 1 Nov. 2019].
Thank you for bringing attention to education issues.It is sad to know that many children out there does not have the privilege to obtain education, even to this day and age. We are indeed very privileged to be in country that ensures basic education for everyone. Females in other parts of the country is still not valued highly enough that they would see the importance for them to be given the opportunity to learn. I hope that this will change eventually and that more people will be given the opportunity to learn.
The lack of education is indeed a real issue, especially when you look at developing countries or in countries which favour the males over the females. It's great that you talked about examples and also the Compulsory Education Act in Singapore! As we are now in Higher Education, it is easy to forget how we got here since the beginning. - Constance