NGOs have called for an end to “inequality” in education and have demanded teacher training, which has had to be “reinvented” due to the Covid-19 pandemic, on the occasion of World Education Day, which is celebrates this Monday, January 24.
This day, which is celebrated with the slogan ‘Change the course, transform education’, seeks this year to show the most important transformations that must be carried out to make everyone’s fundamental right to education a reality.
From SOS Children’s Villages, they warn that the pandemic has “accentuated” the “inequity” of the educational system and points out that both the rate of early school leaving (16%, one of the highest in Europe), and the rate of school failure, are higher in children and adolescents living in low-income households.
In addition, it adds that schooling in the first cycle of Early Childhood Education among boys and girls from families with fewer economic resources is “only 26.3% compared to 62.5% of the middle and upper classes.”
“The socioeconomic conditions of families now have a greater impact on the education of boys and girls. The digital divide, the limitations of resources and capacities to support learning at home and the difficulties of conciliation compromise the right to a quality education of a part of childhood in our country and condition their future”, they have assured from the organization.
In this context, SOS Children’s Villages works to guarantee the right of children and young people in vulnerable situations to a quality education. As he comments, “only four out of ten boys and girls from 0 to 3 years of age access nursery school” in Spain, and “around 350” of them attend each year the five Infant Education Centers that the organization. In them, the development of the little ones is favored and the families are accompanied.
Likewise, in order to reduce the educational gap, Aldeas facilitates, from all its programs, electronic devices and Internet access to children and adolescents at risk, and provides school tutoring and support to families. Thanks to all its programs, during the last year the organization ensured the right to education of 6,345 boys, girls, adolescents and young people.
REINVENT YOURSELF WITH THE PANDEMIC
For its part, the NGO Ayuda en Acción has wanted to focus on teachers who, “since the start of the pandemic and after periods of absence from classes, have had to reinvent themselves” and, therefore, demand the training of teachers as “the best way to continue ensuring optimum standards and excellence” in the world’s schools.
According to the NGO, citing the latest International Study on Teaching and Learning (TALIS), three areas with the greatest need for training by teachers have been identified: teaching students with special educational needs, ICT skills and teaching in multicultural or multilingual contexts .
In the case of Spain, Ayuda en Acción works in educational centers in areas with high levels of socioeconomic vulnerability. In these centers, as specified, more than half of the teaching staff do not have professional resources available to learn how to use digital devices.
In addition, it details that “only 53% have technical and pedagogical skills” necessary to integrate these devices in their classes, according to the COTEC COVID-19 and education report carried out in 2020. The figure represents ten percentage points below the average of the OECD.
The person in charge of Education in Ayuda en Acción, Icíar Bosch, alludes to the greater lack of adult educational references in these contexts. “Where these types of references do not exist, teachers do not always have tools to attend to students. Many more resources are necessary so that these boys and girls can break with the educational disadvantage from which they start,” he assured.
To improve the situation of teachers, Bosch is committed to “consulting” them first. For this reason, Ayuda en Acción carries out participatory diagnoses in 13 schools in Andalusia, the Valencian Community, Extremadura, Galicia and the Principality of Asturias located in neighborhoods and municipalities with high rates of early school leaving. One of the results of these diagnoses is the existence of a sufficient quantity of teacher training offer, but mostly of a theoretical nature.
Regarding the new Organic Law of Education (LOMLOE), Ayuda en Acción hopes that it will be “an opportunity to put teacher training at the center”.
READ WITH UNDERSTANDING
For its part, the NGO World Vision highlights its project ‘Unlock Literacy’, awarded in 2021 by UNESCO, which aims to ensure that all children in school are able to read with comprehension.
In 2019, in a study conducted in Ghana by World Vision, 75% of children reported that they had never been asked to read by a caregiver. The report also revealed that 85% did not have any reading material at home.
Thus came the World Vision program focused on helping children improve the five basic skills of reading acquisition: letter knowledge, word pronunciation, reading fluency, vocabulary and comprehension.
The achievement of these objectives is achieved through the application and monitoring of reading assessments; training teachers to incorporate the five skills into their curricula; mobilizing local communities to participate in after-school reading camps; and the provision of locally relevant and age-appropriate reading material.
Auntie Akos, a mother of two and a regular attendee at the Parent Reading Awareness Workshop, explains the benefits of this program. “I’ve learned that talking to my kids builds their confidence and prepares them for higher learning,” she said.
This new approach to learning also applies to the books themselves, which are written with the local context in mind. That means that the reading material tells stories of the communities themselves. “I was part of the writers’ workshop that produced the books,” explained Wofa Kofi, an elder from the Onuku community.
The participants in this project create books suitable for each level, with colorful illustrations, which are kept in book banks, where children can borrow them to read at home.
Currently, the project is carried out in Ghana in seven districts of the country and benefits 32,000 children from 1 to 3 years of age from 140 schools. Unlock Literacy is live today in more than 30 countries in Africa, Asia and Latin America.
Finally, the BBVA Microfinance Foundation (BBVAMF) advocates guaranteeing education throughout life to achieve a more equitable future, according to the institution, created by BBVA in 2007 and which operates in five Latin American countries.
Precisely, BBVAMF works to facilitate access to education and training for the citizens of the countries in which it operates to improve their lives and support their businesses, given that poverty continues to be a determining factor in access to educational opportunities and only 35% of these entrepreneurs have primary education at most, and 82% are in a vulnerable situation, so financial education and training are key.
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