DAY 2 : INDABA DAY

Indaba Opening Session: 09:00-10:00

1. Opening Remarks:

• BPE Board Chair
• Hilton Foundation Representative
• UNESCO Representative
• Bishop Director for Education ZCCB
• Minister of Education, Zambia

1. Keeping the Girls in School and Creating Gender-Responsive Education Systems: what needs to be done?

• Video – Thematic Action Tracks for Creating Gender-Responsive Education Systems
• Keynote on the need for Creating Gender-Responsive Education Systems
• Inter-generational conversation “From conversation to solutions”

Minister of Education, Tanzania

SDG4 Youth Representative

• Inspirations for transforming education

Ms. Malala

 

 

 

Action Track 1

18th MAY 2023

10:30 – 11:30

Girl-child friendly, Inclusive, equitable, safe and healthy schools in times of COVID-19

Education is at crossroads. While much progress has been made globally in recent decades in education, high rates of poverty, exclusion, insecurity and gender inequality continue to hold millions back from learning. COVID-19, violence, armed conflict, refugee and internal displacement, natural hazards including climate-induced disasters and associated economic migration, and a growing backlash against gender equality and women’s rights are reversing progress and widening inequalities in many contexts. The health and well-being of learners are a critical point: increasing numbers of them are vulnerable to poverty, malnutrition, infectious diseases, early and unintended pregnancy and poor psychosocial and mental health. Marginalised groups are suffering most. We need a new vision for education: schools and their surrounding education communities must be transformed to become more responsive to the needs of learners and to ensure that their rights are met. Bold action is needed if the international community is to meet its commitments and make education inclusive for all. In 2020, some 259 million children, adolescents and youth were out-of-school, including at least half of all refugee children and youth. Although the evidence shows that pre-primary education has a positive impact on learning and development, only 45% of young children in low-income countries, compared to 91% of children in high-income countries, have access to this level of education.

The discussion on inclusive, equitable, safe and healthy schools brings together the latest on Inclusive, equitable, safe and healthy schools in times of COVID-19.

Key issues

• Inclusion and equity
• Gender-responsive transformative education
• Safe schools
• School health and nutrition
• Education in emergencies and protracted crises

Agenda

Session Leads: Population Council

Welcome & housekeeping

(Video) Introduction on inclusive, equitable, safe and healthy schools

Paper Presentations on Inclusive, equitable, safe and healthy schools by Fe y Alegria

Discussion

Closing Remarks

 

 

Action Track 2

18th MAY 2023

10:30 – 12:00

Empowering Teachers for Gender-Responsive and Transformative Education Girls in Africa in the wake of COVID-19

Teachers need to be empowered for them to empower learners. This includes the professional development of teachers and educators to deliver inclusive, learner-centred, gender-responsive and transformative pedagogy and ensure adequate planning time and resources. This should empower them to develop, facilitate and support learners’ agency, self-efficacy and voice, and create safe spaces that respect difference and diversity and meet all learners’ needs. Teachers should be trained to actively recognise and challenge interpersonal biases, stereotypes, discriminatory practices and imbalances of power. Governments must also close gaps in the supply of teachers and educators in rural and disadvantaged schools and emergency and protracted crises contexts, and break the glass ceiling for women in teaching and education leadership positions.

Agenda

Session Leads: Catholic University of Eastern Africa and Catholic University of Zambia

Welcome & housekeeping

(Video) Introduction on Empowering Teachers for Gender-Responsive and Transformative Education Girls in Africa in the wake of COVID-19

Paper Presentations on Empowering Teachers for Gender-Responsive and Transformative Education Girls in Africa in the wake of COVID-19

Discussion

Development of

• Action points for schools
• Action points for governments

Closing Remarks

Action Track 3

18th MAY 2023

10:30 – 12:00

 

Educating Girls in Africa: Learning and skills for life, work and global citizenship

African needs to develop and expand demand-driven, industry-responsive and rights-based education and training systems that consider equity and gender equality. This involves the provision of education that goes beyond the classroom to include school counselling in order to dismantle stereotypes and tackle social norms on careers ‘suitable’ for women and men, persons with disabilities, or other learners and open up equal pathways to education.

We also need to provide an education that empowers learners to transform the world. This calls for the revamping of social studies/analysis and climate education to equip learners with the knowledge and skills needed to tackle the poverty and climate crisis, exercise their rights, and challenge the systems and norms which reinforce gender, climate and other social injustices around the world. Education can be a central and powerful means to support the adaptation and strengthen the resilience of learners and societies. It is also important to ensure education systems become more resilient to climate change to create safe and climate-proof schools. Education must be transformed to respond to the global climate and environmental crisis. A transformed education should aim to deliver strong, coordinated and comprehensive action that will prepare every learner to acquire the knowledge, skills, values, and attitudes to tackle climate change and to promote sustainable development.

Agenda

Session Leads: UNESCO Africa, Jesuit Education Network Africa (JASBEAM) and Educate Magis

Welcome & housekeeping

Video introduction on Educating Girls in Africa: Learning and skills for life, work and global citizenship

 

Paper Presentations on Educating Girls in Africa: Learning and skills for life, work and global citizenship

Discussion

Development of

• Action points for schools
• Action points for governments

Closing Remarks

Action Track 4

18th MAY 2023

10:30 – 12:00

Implementing Relationship and Sex Education (RSE) and Integral Human Development in (Catholic) Schools in Africa

Today’s children and young people are growing up in an increasingly complex world and living their lives seamlessly on and offline. This presents many positive and exciting opportunities, but also challenges and risks. In this environment, children and young people need to know how to be safe and healthy, and how to manage their academic, personal and social lives in a positive and integral way. This is why there have been calls to make Relationships Education compulsory in all primary schools and Relationships and Sex Education compulsory in all secondary schools, as well as making Health Education compulsory in all schools.

The key decisions on these subjects must be informed by a thorough engagement process, including a public call for evidence to facilitate responses and views from parents, young people, schools and experts and a public consultation. This will create both a depth and breadth of views that is clear and should therefore help in articulating best approaches on the matter. There are, understandably legitimate areas of contention that need to be resolved. The guiding principles have always been that compulsory subject content must be age appropriate, developmentally and culturally appropriate. Relationship and Sex Education must be taught sensitively and inclusively, with respect to the backgrounds and beliefs of pupils and parents while always with the aim of providing pupils with the knowledge they need of the law.

Parents and carers are the prime educators for children on many of these matters. Schools complement and reinforce this role and have told us that they see building on what pupils learn at home as an important part of delivering a good education.  There are already many schools delivering outstanding provision to support the personal development and pastoral needs of their pupils. After thoughtful consideration and sufficient consultation these subjects must be deliverable and give schools flexibility to shape their curriculum according to the needs of their pupils and communities.

Agenda

Session Leads:   UCCB, KCCB and ZCCB Education Desks (Catholic Schools)

Population Council

Welcome & housekeeping

Video introduction on Implementing Relationship and Sex Education (RSE) and Integral Human Development in (Catholic) Schools in Africa

Paper Presentations on Implementing Relationship and Sex Education (RSE) and Integral Human Development in (Catholic) Schools in Africa

Discussion

Development of

• Action points for schools
• Action points for governments

Closing RemarkS

Action Track 5

18th MAY 2023

10:30 – 12:00

Re-entry policy school re-entry for pregnant girls: Policy vs practice in Africa. What more should be done?

Poor implementation of and several contentions around re-entry policies have forced many pregnant girls to drop out of school. This was exacerbated during the pandemic with many countries in Africa recording high numbers of teenage pregnancies during school closures.  A major weakness in Africa is that governments and education systems do not collect gender-disaggregated data, or track student progress and policies for smooth re-entry in a manner needed to understand and address the needs of girls.

Some governments and schools have mooted and enacted interventions that enhance girls’ education, which include reducing or eliminating fees for girls, offering scholarships and books and other basic needs, such as sanitary towels and meals, and providing mentorship, guiding and coaching. Many advocates and experts contend that these interventions, however, must be anchored on effective school re-entry policies that allow pregnant girls to go back to school. Many countries in Africa have instituted school re-entry policies.

However, while appreciating the role of policy in providing the legal basis for the enrolment of teenage mothers in school, their effectiveness must be accompanied by adequate conversation and consensus for action, awareness creation among girls and families about the policy, awareness for school leaders and teachers so they may provide the necessary conditions for girls to go back to school, and collective effort to address the potential cultural challenges that may inhibit learning for the girls.

 

Agenda

Session Leads: CAMFED Zambia

Welcome & housekeeping

Video introduction on Re-entry policy school re-entry for pregnant girls: Policy vs practice in Africa. What more should be done?

 

Paper Presentations on Re-entry policy school re-entry for pregnant girls: Policy vs practice in Africa. What more should be done?

Discussion

Development of

• Action points for schools
• Action points for governments

Closing Remarks

 

Action Track 6

18th MAY 2023

10:30 – 12:00

Financing of education in sub-Saharan Africa for a full recovery

To build back better education systems adversely affected by the pandemic, higher shares of domestic finance are needed to meet SDG 4 goals, particularly given post-COVID challenges, of keeping schools open, ensuring continuity of learning and gender parity in enrolment. COVID increased the annual financing gap for nations to reach SDG 4 by one third. Aid to education has fallen, placing even greater responsibilities on African governments to provide adequate domestic financing for education. At the height of the pandemic, mounting debt, slowdown of GDP in real terms, including loss of tax revenue from COVID’s economic impact, and other competing national priorities also impeded effective financing of the education sector. Yet, a commitment to financing schooling, learning and gender equality is key to a productive workforce, a quick recovery, future growth, development and resilience.

Households in Africa have to balance between meeting everyday needs and education expenditures. This poses a risk for children, especially girls, being exposed to child labor and child marriage as family livelihoods diminish and economic crises continues. Every effort must be made to ensure that girls and young women return to school or be kept in school.

Financing education must remain a top political priority, as the African continent is dependent on its human resource for both recovery and development. Financing education for most African governments during COVID-19 requires adequate evidence to inform decision-making in resource allocation, while there are competing health-related priorities. The justification for resourcing girls’ education needs strong social-economic analysis backed by gender disaggregated learning data. To fully recover, build back better from COVID, and reimagine education, equity and equality must be front and centre. Also, important is addressing efficiency in spending. It is estimated that almost one third of education spending is lost to inefficiencies. Of key concern is technical efficiency (using minimum resource levels to achieve best outcomes) and internal efficiency (minimizing dropout and repetition).

Countries in Africa have committed to spending at least 20% of national budgets on education over the next 5 years. These commitments are a crucial shield against learning losses resulting from the economic impact of COVID-19. The Bakhita Partnership for Education (BPE) and the entire education community in Africa must build on this political ambition to mobilise more and better domestic financing and tackle the unfinished business of getting all children, especially girls, in school and learning.

Agenda

Session Leads: JCTR, Jesuit Hakimani Centre and CRTP Hekima University College

Welcome & housekeeping

Video introduction on Financing of education in sub-Saharan Africa for a full recovery Paper Presentations on Financing of education in sub-Saharan Africa for a full recovery Discussion

Development of

• Action points for schools
• Action points for governments

Closing Remarks

Action Track 7

18th MAY 2023

10:30 – 12:00

Educating at the margins and in emergencies: educating girls in contexts of poverty, war situations and harsh climate impacts

A fundamental responsibility of education is to provide open and equal opportunities for students to learn, succeed and positively contribute to their local, national and global societies. Great strides are being made in increasing educational access, retention, completion and success, yet there is still work to be done particularly for students from disadvantaged or marginalised groups. Unprecedented shifts in migration patterns are causing demographic changes around the world.

Additionally, governments, societies and higher education institutions are increasingly recognising the need and responsibility to create policy, legal and institutional frameworks for providing more and better opportunities for people from historically marginalised groups to gain access and achieve success in their education. A brief global scan shows that several humanitarian groups like the Jesuit Refugee Service (JRS), Fe y Alegria and even humanitarian driven universities, schools and individuals serving the specific needs of marginalised groups.

However, education institutions committed to providing educational opportunities for local communities marginalised along ethnic, racial, religious or other lines can be found on every continent. In light of shifting demographics and the growing focus on educational opportunity and access, increasing numbers of colleges and universities will be serving students from marginalised groups. And yet, for too long, these institutions have operated in a policy vacuum leading to insufficient public support for providing education for populations in contexts of vulnerability and marginalisation. This, in turn, has resulted in missed opportunities to resolve longunsettled discrepancies in education attainment by marginalised studentsand  populations especially girls. And those in contexts of conflict, in places impact by extreme climate events like flooding or drought.

Agenda

Session Leads: Jesuit Refugee Service, Fe y Alegria Africa and Latin America and Red Cross

Welcome & housekeeping

Video introduction on: Educating at the margins and in emergencies: educating girls in contexts of poverty, war situations and harsh climate impacts

Paper Presentations on Educating at the margins and in emergencies: educating girls in contexts of poverty, war situations and harsh climate impacts

Discussion

Development of

• Action points for schools
• Action points for aid and humanitarian organisations and governments
• Action points for governments

Closing Remarks

Action Track 8

18th MAY 2023

10:30 – 12:00

 

The Impact of COVID-19 on the Mental Health of Girls

In ordinary times, adolescents undergo rapid physical, psychological, and cognitive developmental changes that create a critical window of opportunity in their lives. At this point of transformation, social and physical conditions can impact their health and wellbeing, and they need the greatest support and guidance in their health, education, social life.

A huge proportion of adolescent girls in sub-Saharan Africa live in households with persistently poor socio-economic conditions, inequities, and gender norms that undermine their health and development. They also face serious challenges to fulfilling their sexual and reproductive health including vulnerability to HIV, sexually transmitted infections, and unintended and unsafe pregnancy.

During times of social crisis, like the COVID-19 and Ebola crises, the risks for adolescent girls are intensified. In an unconducive environment with many social and physical changes that are not favourable in their nurturing, adolescents’ health and wellbeing can be negatively impacted heightening their risk of negative health outcomes, bringing a lifetime of negative long and short-term consequences. The emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic certainly had a disproportionate impact on adolescent girls.

This Action track seeks to understand the effect of COVID-19 and its related preventive measures on the social and mental wellbeing of adolescent girls in Africa especially urban informal settlements, and rural areas. This action track builds on research done among adolescent girls and will also involve the adolescent girls themselves.

Agenda

Session Leads: Population Council Kenya and Georgetown University

Welcome & housekeeping

Video introduction on: Educating at the margins and in emergencies: educating girls in contexts of poverty, war situations and harsh climate impacts

Paper Presentations on Educating at the margins and in emergencies: educating girls in contexts of poverty, war situations and harsh climate impacts

Discussion

Development of

• Action points for schools
• Action points for aid and humanitarian organisations and governments
• Action points for governments

Closing Remarks

 

 

Action Track 9

18th MAY 2023

10:30 – 12:00

Catholic Schools and Preferential for the Poor: Are Catholic or Mission Schools Still Up to the Task?

The preferential option for the poor is integral to the teaching of Jesus (especially in Luke’s gospel) and the Church and has arguably gained increased importance as the levels of child poverty and vulnerability rise in Africa. Luke’s gospel is often referred to as the gospel of the poor: Jesus demonstrates great concern for the poor throughout the gospel as can be found in the Magnificat (…and exalted those of low degree; He has filled the hungry with good things, 1:52-53). Further examples can be found in the Sermon on the Plain (Blessed are you poor, for yours is the kingdom of god. Blessed are you that hunger now, for you shall be satisfied, 6:20-21) and in the Parable of Lazarus and the rich man (16:19- 31).  The reading in public and his comments are the first words of his teaching articulated in Luke’s gospel provide an overview of his teaching and mission: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, for he has anointed me; he has sent me to preach good news to the poor, to proclaim release for prisoners and sight for the blind, to send the downtrodden away relieved, and to proclaim the Lord’s year of favour.

When Jesus had finished reading, he states that: this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing. The time had come for the scripture reading to begin to be fulfilled. Many of the Catholic schools that were established throughout Africa especially during the colonial era, before the introduction of mass compulsory state funded school education, were founded with a mission to serve and educate the poor. Religious orders and male and female (but especially female) congregations such as the Jesuits, the White Fathers, Marist Brothers, De la Salle Brothers, Sisters of Mercy, Notre Dame sisters, Loreto Sisters, Dominican Sisters, Franciscan Sisters and the Daughters of Charity have historically made significant and substantial contributions to this education of the poor. This importance of the mission to the poor was rearticulated in 1965 in the Vatican document, Gravissimum Educationis, which draws on this history and interprets this mission for the new era of the late twentieth century to the twenty-first century:

The Sacred Council of the Church earnestly entreat pastors and all the faithful to spare no sacrifice in helping Catholic schools fulfill their function in a continually more perfect way, and especially in caring for the needs of those who are poor in the goods of this world or who are deprived of the assistance and affection of a family or who are strangers to the gift of faith.

 

This is what the Medellin conference of the Latin American Bishops of 1968 adapted as the ‘preferential option for the poor’ of Catholic schools. This preferential option for the poor is integral to the Catholic commitment to follow Christ. The enactment of this preferential option recognises the inherent dignity of each person as made in the image of God and highlights solidarity with others, an acknowledgement of the interdependence of people. Those who work in contemporary Catholic schools will recognise this history of the mission to the poor the continuing legacy of this history and the increased urgency of exercising the preferential option for the poor. Additionally, there have been multi dimensional, interpretations of the meaning of the word ‘poor’, ranging from the materially poor, the culturally poor, the emotional poor and the marginalised to the spiritually poor.

Various international initiatives have been launched to tackle the challenge of child poverty such as the Millennium Development Goals (2000) and now the Sustainable Development Goals (2015). Nevertheless, the contemporary levels of material girl child poverty and deprivation across Africa can only be described as alarming and there are indications that they are increasing. Children, especially girls, are dependents and their poverty reflects the poverty of their families - families on low or no incomes at all.

Over the years, anecdotal evidence shows that more and more, Catholic schools are predominantly populated by children from high-middle class families who were able to score high marks or whose parents had sufficient influence to take them to those schools. Accordingly, Catholic schools in Africa are more and more becoming elitist and less and less pro poor. This is compounded by the fact that these schools that were originally supported by financing from the Northern countries, the missionaries’ countries of origin, no longer receive those cash inflows and therefore have to charge economic fees that can only be afforded by the middle class in order for them to survive economically. Under such constraints, the original mission of Catholic and other faith-based schools to the poor has come under pressure. Hence the question that this Action Track is treating is: Educating girls at the margins: Are Catholic or Mission Schools Still Up to the Task?

Agenda

Session Leads: Jesuit Association of Secondary and Basic Education in Africa and Madagascar (JASBEAM), Fe y Alegria and the Bakhita Partnership for Education

Welcome & housekeeping

Video introduction on: Catholic Schools and Preferential for the Poor: Are Catholic or Mission Schools Still Up to the Task?

Paper Presentations on Catholic Schools and Preferential for the Poor: Are Catholic or Mission Schools Still Up to the Task?

Discussion

Development of

• Action points for Catholic/Mission/Faith Based Schools
• Action points for Episcopal Conference and Religious Congregations
• Actions points for Governments

Closing Remarks

Action Track 10

18th MAY 2023

10:30 – 12:00

Creating Gender- Responsive Education Systems:

Effective Integration of Trauma Informed Educational Practices

 

 

It seems quite evident that the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic have had deleterious and serious consequences on the mental health and well-being of children in general, but most especially girls. Covid is now part of a constellation of factors inhibiting the girl child’s education and risks are gender-specific. As has been reported in the previous Indaba held in Nairobi, Kenya in 2022, the signs and symptoms in girls were and continue to be multidimensional - more poverty, food insecurity, less education, more teen pregnancies, more trafficking, more violence, child labor, in addition to managing caregiver loss. Addressing potential trauma and abuse, including trafficking, will be critical.  Disruption of traditional social patterns due in part to COVID, but likewise climate change, persistent ethnic strife, etc. have exacerbated existing gender inequities and consequent vulnerabilities. At the same time, girls have also shown remarkable resiliency, adaptability, creativity, surrogate parenting skills, and remarkable courage and fortitude in the face of almost inconceivable challenges and demands. The global trauma of the pandemic has created more specific traumas in communities, schools, families, and in these remarkable children and young girls.

These realties expressed in complex and multiple traumas are manifested in various ways and the more obvious symptoms of anxiety, depression, isolation, undeveloped maturation, higher drop-out rates, limited access and exclusion from school, inability to develop and maintain basic skills. Additionally, administrators, staff, and teachers are also acutely impacted by these traumas and are often survivors of traumas themselves while also showing enormous signs of resiliency, creativity and courage. How might this catastrophe be turned into an opportunity?

One possible solution when resources are limited for individual counseling and support is to address these issues through systemic interventions on every level in creating knowledge, awareness, and skills for children, staff, administrators, families, and teachers in a “trauma informed” education.  Solutions seem daunting. The possibilities however, might lie in a communal, school-based set of interventions that address trauma in each level of the educational system. Research indicates that the best systemic interventions are balanced between strengths-based approaches- identifying resiliency factors - and those areas of concern or challenge. They function within several (6) core principles: “safety; trustworthiness and transparency; peer support, collaboration and mutuality; empowerment, voice, and choice; and finally, cultural, historical and gender issues.” Lifting up the voices of the girl child is the first step in an ongoing feedback loop to better discern the multiple paths forward. That same effort would be necessary within each of the actors in this “trauma-informed” approach to healing, equity, justice, and recovery.

Agenda

Session Leads: Georgetown University

Welcome & housekeeping

Video introduction on: Creating Gender- Responsive Education Systems: Effective Integration of Trauma Informed Educational Practices

Paper Presentations on Creating Gender- Responsive Education Systems: Effective Integration of Trauma Informed Educational Practices

Discussion

Development of

• Action points for Catholic/Mission/Faith Based Schools
• Action points for Episcopal Conference and Religious Congregations
• Actions points for Governments

Closing Remarks