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Of investment in education: is Nigeria still Africa’s giant?

Adekunle Adebajo

By Adekunle Adebajo

For as far as most Nigerians can remember, this country has been proudlyreferred to astheGiant of Africa. This title was earned by virtue of her intimidating economy, her huge population and her big brother role during the years immediately following her independence from British rule. However, the country is fast losing the respect accorded to her in the past, not only in Africa but across the globe. The factors responsible for this are not far-fetched: poor supply of electricity, poor state of infrastructure, notoriousness for internet fraud, corruption, an inferior quality of education among others.

Homing in on the last, it has been discovered that the state of the country’s schools can be easily explained financially. Comparing the budgetary behaviour of Nigeria and some other countries across Africa reveals that Nigeria’s giant status is not found where it matters the most, particularly in the level of attention paid to the education sector. While other African countries seem to have recognised the potency of education as a midwife to development, a better economy, a safer society and a more prosperous population, Nigeria’s priorities are still found in sustaining an excessively expensive system of governance and in national security, the funds for which often reflect better in foreign bank accounts rather than local battlefields. Rather than set the pace in implementing global standards, Nigeria evidently has a lot to learn from smaller and younger countries across the continent.

Kenya
Kenya’s education sector has traditionally received the lion’s share of the country’s national budget to take care of teachers’ salaries, and primary and secondary school subsidies; and this tradition was upheld in the 2015 budget.In April 2016, the Kenyan government tabled its 2016/17 national budget estimates before the National Assembly. The Budget Policy Statement (BPS) ceilings in all the sectors summed up to 1,498 Kenyan shillings; but the Gross Expenditure Estimates, after the increase by the Treasury, amounted to 1.667 trillion Kenyan shillings. Based on the BPS, education received a total of 346.6 Ksh, which in other words is 23.1% of the entire budget. This figure is topped only by the allocation to Energy, Infrastructure and ICT, some of the projects under which are also academic in nature, for instance the laptop project gulping Ksh 17.58 billion.

South Africa
In the 2016/17 budgetary year in South Africa, the country spent R213.7 billion on basic education, which is about 15% of the total budget; and, according to the National Treasury, the allocation is projected to rise an average of 7.4% annually over the following three fiscal years. In terms of percentage, this allocation, according to data from the United Nations, trumps those of the United States, United Kingdom and Germany. As projected, more recent figures are even more education-friendly. According to aUnited Nations Children Fund (UNICEF) document titled, “Education Budget, South Africa, 2017/2018”, the budget for school children is presently 17% of total government expenditure.

Ghana
Ghana has also established herself as one of Africa’s big spenders on education. In 2013, she committed a whopping 31% of her budget to education as against Nigeria’s 8% in the same year. The following year, the figure dropped to 20.5%; and it declined even more in 2015 to 17.8% and in 2016 to 13.5%. In 2017, however, the Ministry of Education’s budget experienced a 20.7% increase from the previous year’s figure; that is from 7.55 billion Ghanaian cedes to 9.12 billion Ghanaian cedes. And in 2018, the allocation has increased by another 11.6% as the government proposed last year to spend GHS 10.18 billion on the Ministry. This amounts to 16.42% of the total budget of GHS 62 billion.

Egypt
As for Egypt, one country whose universities alwaysstand out on the continental ranking, the government proposed to spend EGP 104 billion on education in the 2016/2017 fiscal year, which amounted to 11.1% of government spending in that year. This is an improvement on the allocation of EGP 99.3 billion the previous year. The increment in the allocation is partly attributable to the Egyptian Constitution. According to the document, the government is required to spend at least 3 per cent of the Gross National Product (GNP) on healthcare and at least 4 per cent on education every year. It is noteworthy that the global average education budget in relation to GDP stands at 5%.

Lesotho
This country is renowned to spend most part of its GDP on education. According to the budget speech to the parliament for the 2017/2018 fiscal year presented by Dr.MoeketsiMajoro, the Minister of Finance, the government proposed to spend a total of M2.423 billion on education and training in 2018. This, to put it differently, is 19.2% of the entire budget. The previous year, the government had spent 20.7% on

the same sector.

Now to Nigeria
In the acclaimed giant of Africa and home to the largest black population on earth, regard for education appears to be an anathema to all forms of government, whether led by a military dictator or a democratically elected individual, a Northerner or a Southerner, a Major General or a Ph.D. holder. An assessment of the trend from 1999 shows that the lowest allocation, 4.46%, to education was in 1999, and the highest, 11.44%, was in 2015. The average allocation in all 16 years of democratic rule is 9.14%. In the pre-1999 years of military rule, the sector did not fare any better as a study has shown that the average allocation to education between the years of 1981 and 1998 was a meagre 4.18%.

The situation has in fact worsened under the present administration. The first budget presented by President MuhammaduBuhari in December 2015 for the 2016 fiscal year was in stark contrast to the double digits legacy left by his predecessor. Education received ₦369.6 billion, which was 6.07% of the entire budget. In the 2017 budget proposals, N448.01billion was allocated to education, representing about 6% of the ₦7.30 trillion budget. And in the 2018 Appropriation Bill, the government proposed an allocation of ₦435.01 billion to education, which is just 7.04% of the total budgeted amount of ₦8.612 trillion.

Nigeria against the world
Across Africa, most countries are spending more and more on education by the year. As a matter of fact, government expenditure on education in Sub-Saharan Africa increased from US$12 billion in 2000 to US$67 billion in 2013 representing over 450% growth. This trend has resulted in higher literacy rates, lesser numbers of out-of-school children, improved quality of learning, and more foreign investments as well as greater industrialisation owing to greater availability of skilled labour. It has also led to a gradual increase in GDP for many of these countries as educated citizens naturally earn more than those who do benefit from formal learning.

Nigeria, on the other hand, especially under the presidency of MuhammaduBuhari, has yet to board the train of progress, despite cries from various corners. For this country, it has become an unending cycle of budgetary disregard for education, and complaints from stakeholders, accompaniedby silence from the government. The same pattern is repeated year in year out. This habit has affected us greatly, because not only are our schools not reckoned with on the international stage, the culture of academic tourism has seen our economy shed weight to the benefit of such countries as the United States, the United Kingdom and even Ghana.

In 2012, the Chairman of Exam Ethics International, Ike Onyechere, said Nigerians spend over ₦1.5 trillion annually on students studying abroad. ₦160 billion out of this goes to Ghana, while ₦80 billion goes to the United Kingdom. Likewise, in 2016, the Chairman of the Senate Committee on Tertiary Institution and Tertiary Education Trust Fund, Senator BintaMasi, said Nigeria spends over $2 billion annually as capital flight on education abroad. With this figure alone, Nigeria can build one or two world-class universities every year, considering the fact that Pakistan planned to spend $750 million for each of its new universities of engineering, science and technology and Qatar’s Cornell University spent the same amount establishing its School of Medicine in 2002.

The country’s lacklustre attitude towards education equally reflects in the ranking of universities across the globe and in Africa. According to the 2016 Times Higher Education World University Rankings, there is only one Nigerian university in the top 15 ranking in Africa, and that university, the University of Ibadan, is number 14 on the list. On the same list, we have six universities from South Africa, three from Egypt, two from Morocco, one from Uganda (ranked fourth), one from the Ghana (ranked seventh), and one from Kenya (ranked eighth). A similar pattern recurred in the 2018 ranking.

Finally
It is high time the Nigerian government recognised that recognising the good in education is for the good of the country. We do not have to go as far as the extreme West or the far East to get examples of countries reaping bountifully from great investments in education. Right here in Africa, there are more than sufficient instances. The Nigerian National Assembly should adopt the Egyptian legislative model by incorporating, into the constitution, a benchmark for budgetary allocations to the education sector. This preferably must not fall below 5% of the nation’s GDP or 20% of government’s annual spending.

Our schools are ailing; and it is not by scrapping Post UTME or quelling industrial actions that they will get better. We must make conscious, radical efforts by investing all we can to turn things around for good. Before we complain that our graduates are unemployable, we must ask first if our schools are habitable and if our facilities are universally acceptable. But beyond just dumping huge sums of money into the sector in theory, the government has to also ensure a balance in recurrent and capital expenditures as well as an effective implementation of whatever plans are laid out on paper. If we can do this, then the return of the giant to her rightful place is not only inevitable but will happen before long, before our very eyes.

Source:

https://www.thenigerianvoice.com/news/263557/of-investment-in-education-is-nigeria-still-africas-giant.html

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Kenya: How our university education system went terribly wrong

Noticias

Kenya/ March 13, 2018/By EVAN MWANGI/Source: https://www.nation.co.ke/

The student unrest at Meru University of Science at Technology (MUST) that left a student leader dead last week exposes the soft underbelly of higher education institutions, once considered citadels of knowledge and a sure ticket to a better future.

The student, Evans Njoroge, was shot dead by the police as he and his fellow students protested higher tuition fees, bad management of their university, and poor facilities at the campus.

These are complaints also heard in both private and public universities across the country.

LECTURERS’ STRIKE
Public university lecturers have also downed their tools over what one professor at the University of Nairobi termed the “same old story of bargaining agreements that the government and university councils refuse to honour”.

The lecturers have not been paid their allowances because the universities claim they don’t have money to implement an agreement over improved pay.

The lecturers are also asking for a 150 per cent salary increase and a 100 per cent raise in housing allowance to cushion them from the high cost of living.

Already in coffins awaiting their mass funeral, only divine intervention can save Kenyan universities, as their degeneration reflects the general rot in a nation riddled with corruption, poor planning, and indifference to excellence.

“Universities are dealing with the same dysfunctional politics as the rest of the country,” Dr Wandia Njoya of Daystar University, a vocal critic of the way universities are run like businesses or dirty-handed political campaign machines, says.

“It’s all about ego and status, including expensive campaigning for campus positions.”

SATELLITE CAMPUSES
Most experts we interviewed noted that the main problem facing Kenyan universities is the mushrooming of substandard campuses.

With rapid expansion of universities to cater for rising demand for degrees (from seven public universities in 2012 to 33 in 2018), the quality of teaching and research has sunk to the lowest ebb.

Kenya’s 60 university colleges educate about 540,000 students annually, graduating about 50,000 students each year.

The need to cater for rising demands in higher education and finance university programmes after the government cuts on education spending has had its toll on quality.

Staffing is outstretched. “We don’t have the matching workforce and personnel to staff the increasing masses of students,” Dr Teresa Okoth-Oluoch, a specialist in language education and curriculum development at Masinde Muliro University, where she is the director of the Centre for Quality Teaching and Learning, says.

“The so-called university campuses dotting villages seriously compromise quality.”

FUNDING
Between 2013 and 2016, universities tried to fill the gap left by declining government funding by opening campuses all over the place, sometimes next to pubs, strip clubs, and doomsday churches.

But with high school mass failures in the past two years, these satellite campuses are starved of students and are falling like underwear in brothels next door.

“The competition to open campuses and village shoeshine universities is never about academic excellence,” Prof Maloba Wekesa of the University of Nairobi, who is also the organising secretary of the University Academic Staff Union, says.

“Most of those colleges are just income-generation projects and degree mill centres especially for politicians.”

Neoliberal policies that view everything in terms of profits have hit the universities where it hurts.

“Academics have bought into the lie that the way to run universities efficiently is to run them as profit-making businesses,” Daystar’s Njoya says in an interview with the Sunday Nation.

“Education is a completely different kind of organisation. We invest in people. We are accountable to the people we teach and the people in society.”

STUDENT ADMISSION
She adds that unless education is treated as a “public good” and not a profit-making venture, “we will have to cut corners on education: We have bigger-size classes taught by part-time lecturers to avoid spending money on faculty stability and quality education.”

Whereas universities across the world are allowed to set the standards regarding the students they want to admit, the Kenyan government requires all universities, including private ones, to admit only students who score C+ and above in high school.

Only 15 per cent of the Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education candidate achieved the cut-off score last year.

The number is just enough for the slots in public universities, leaving private universities and income-generation streams in public universities without prospective students.

PRIVATE UNIVERSITIES
Professor Mumo Kisau, the chairman of the Kenya Association of Private Universities, was quoted last week saying that private institutions have suffered a reduction of between 30,000 and 40,000 students this year.

Only Jesus Christ can save most of the faith-based universities whose prospective students rarely meet the high standards the government has set for universities.

With dwindling enrolment numbers, it is hard for these universities to remain afloat.

In late January, the Ministry of Education shutdown Presbyterian University of East Africa because the university finances were allegedly not in order.

This left its over 1,000 students in limbo, but the institution has since gone to court to oppose the closure.

ACCOMMODATION
Lukenya University Vice-Chancellor Maurice N. Amutabi thinks something should be done about the numbers of those allowed to proceed with university education.

“We have more spaces and capacity than the number of students we admit.

«It would have been good to have at least 20 per cent joining university than the current 10 per cent of all KCSE candidates,” the professor of history, who has previously worked at Kisii University and Central Washington University in the United States, says.

No tangible solutions are expected soon. Just as they prefer to receive their medical care abroad because Kenyan healthcare is comatose, our senior government officials, including those in the presidency, the opposition, and the education ministry give the local education system a wide berth.

They enrol their children in elite universities in Europe, America, New Zealand, and Australia.

GRADUATES
The only investment the ruling elites have in local universities is to ensure these institutions don’t produce independent-minded graduates.

A systematically degraded education system ensures universities churn out masses of graduates that are easy to control ideologically and acquiesce to the neoliberal agenda of the ruling elites.

With corruption affecting every sphere of public services, public universities are starved of the money they need to produce graduates worth giving a second glance on the job market.

Education officials misappropriate the money set aside for research.

“Funding of public universities is tied to how the Ministry of Education is able to do its budget, which mostly caters for salaries. Much of the (money) allocated for research is ‘eaten’ by ministry officials” Prof Maloba Wekesa says.

“We need a constant fraction of the budget to get to the specific universities to support research.”

INCOME
Although in dire financial straits, the universities have not been terribly creative in fundraising.

“Kenyan university financial models have never taken into account programme costs or developed innovative ways to protect the institutions from financial disasters,” Prof Ishmael Munene of Northern Arizona University in the US, who has written widely on the problems facing universities in Africa, says.

The shallow economic base means that the universities cannot provide basic needs for their students and staff.

Prof Munene mentions alumni donations, endowment funds, strategic investments, and industry partnerships among the possible initiatives to raise money and diversify income sources.

“The government is encouraging universities to find alternative sources of funding, including entrepreneurship, without compromising their core mandate,” Prof Mwenda Ntarangwi, a respected academic and the CEO of the Commission for Higher Education, says.

DONATIONS

His attempts to put in place quality assurance mechanisms will be a tall order, given the cynicism in the government structures.

Western universities frequently receive donations from philanthropists.

Buildings on campus and endowed chairs are named in honour of these donors.

Endowed chairs provide a bait to attract and retain the best brains around.

However, except maybe the industrialist Manu Chandaria, rich people in Kenya cannot be expected to come to a university’s aid with donations to boost teaching and research.

CORRUPTION
The interest of the country’s rich class is primitive accumulation of stolen wealth, following a familiar script: run down one parastatal after another by stealing their assets, then take to Twitter daily to share with the nation inspirational quotes on how to get rich.

Experts think the universities should specialise in the areas they are strongest in.

At the moment, the universities duplicate one another, imitating the University of Nairobi, and offering unviable courses.

Professional bodies have rejected degrees from several public universities.

For example, the Engineers Board of Kenya has previously blacklisted engineers trained at Jaramogi Oginga Odinga University of Science and Technology, Meru University of Science and Technology, South Eastern Kenya University (Seku), Technical University of Kenya, and University of Eldoret.

“What we need is a differentiation of institutions with some specialising in good teaching, others in excellent research, and still others providing education midway between research and teaching,” Prof Munene says.

SALARY
He sees in Kenyan universities outdated pedagogical practices that discourage critical thinking; weak doctoral courses that duplicate work done at the undergraduate level; poor governance structures; and the absence of strategic planning as the other challenges facing Kenyan universities.

With low pay, university academic staff resort to moonlighting to make ends meet.

There is hardly any time to prepare for classes, and they end up giving students yellow notes. Cases of missing marks are common across all universities.

Without any clearly laid down ethical standards, universities watch as professors sexually abuse their hapless students for good grades. Rarely are sexual predators on campus punished.

The systematic degrading of education to serve the ruling class has been effective.

TRIBALISM

Now Kenyan universities value mediocrity above anything else. Professors are hired on the basis of their ethnicity, and top brains are edged out to teach in South Africa, Europe or America.

The lack of basic management skills are the bane of university administration, and woe unto you if you expect a university administrator to respond to your enquiries on anything.

“You will not get feedback from them because they don’t know the importance of feedback and research,” Prof Amutabi says.

“The university fat cats are too busy to answer calls or emails.”

Ethnocentrism is the order of the day on campus. “Some people think universities belong to them because they bear their ethnic name or are located in their counties,” Prof Amutabi says.

POLITICIANS

On September 2016, Uasin Gishu Governor Jackson Mandagoled demonstrations to demand the sacking of the Moi University vice-chancellor on the basis that he did not come from the dominant ethnic community around the university.

The students have also responded well to the unrelenting assault on higher education.

Congratulations! Even those born in the city and cannot say “good morning” in their mother tongues are as tribalistic as their grandparents in the rural backwaters.

Their response to political crises is based purely on tribe, usually to secure power for their ethnic tin gods.

LEADERS
Like the rest of Kenya, the students choose their leaders on the basis of how much the candidate can drink, smoke illicit substances, and steal from the public coffers.

Unlike in the 1970s, when student leaders practised selfless ideals, their counterparts today are protégés of the corrupt national leadership, whom they eventually join at the national level to continue the vicious circle of degrading universities. 

The few student leaders who don’t play ball are shot in cold blood in potato farms — left to die like the universities whose interests they agitate for.

evanmwangi@gmail.com Twitter: @evanmwangi

Source:

https://www.nation.co.ke/news/education/How-our-university-education-system-went-terribly-wrong/2643604-4336630-cj92ug/index.html

 

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La sequía y el conflicto podrían obligar a 4,7 millones de niños a dejar la escuela en África

Noticias

África/03 de Marzo de 2018/Autor: Redacción Iagua/www.iagua.e

Unos 4,7 millones de niños podrían verse obligados a dejar la escuela como consecuencia de los conflictos y la sequía que afectan a los países del este de África, lo que suponen unos 90.000 niños a la semana que verían truncados sus estudios, 12.000 al día, según ha alertado Save the Children.

La organización ha destacado que, para muchos, este sería el segundo año en el que se ven obligados a abandonar las clases por ese motivo y ha explicado que las escuelas cierran por la sequía y por la falta de estudiantes, porque los menores dejan de acudir para migrar con su familia a otras zonas donde haya agua y pastos para los animales.

Cuando los niños de Sudán del Sur, Somalia, Etiopía y Kenia dejan de acudir a las aulas, «crece inmediatamente el riesgo de que sean sometidos a abusos como el matrimonio infantil, el tráfico de menores y la prostitución«, ha advertido la ONG en un comunicado.

En Sudán del Sur, Somalia, Etiopía y Kenia casi 21 millones de personas carecen de seguridad alimentaria por la sequía o los conflictos armados que se desarrollan en la zona

«Si 12.000 niños abandonan la escuela cada día, esta región perderá toda una generación, una generación que no solo no será capaz de alcanzar todo su potencial, sino que se enfrentará a grandes riesgos para su salud y su seguridad», ha subrayado el director regional de Save the Children en África oriental y austral, David Wright.

«Mantener las escuelas abiertas durante la sequía es especialmente importante porque les proporcionan a los menores una oportunidad perfecta para disponer de comida, agua y medicina para que puedan aprender, permanecer seguros y conseguir grandes cosas», ha añadido Wright.

En Sudán del Sur, Somalia, Etiopía y Kenia casi 21 millones de personas carecen de seguridad alimentaria por la sequía o los conflictos armados que se desarrollan en la zona, según Save the Children.

En Sudán del Sur, la organización espera que el número de menores de cinco años que sufren de malnutrición se duplique con respecto al de 2017, llegando a 1,1 millones. En Somalia, el número de personas que necesitan asistencia alimenticia se ha multiplicado por seis, según la ONG, y solo el 30 por ciento de los niños pueden ir a la escuela.

Este mes, en Etiopía ya han cerrado 623 escuelas, según el Ministerio de Educación del país, mientras que el de Kenia ha advertido de que solo el 30 por ciento de los niños acuden a clase en Wajir y Mandera, áreas en el noroeste del país que suelen sufrir las sequías de manera especial.

Save the Children ha instado a continuar proporcionando financiación a las escuelas en África oriental y a que se escolarice a aquellos niños que ya se han visto obligados a dejar de acudir a clase. La organización va a poner en marcha varias medidas, como ofrecer comida, agua y vacunaciones en las escuelas, mantener horarios de clase flexibles o llevar las clases a donde sea necesario, como a los campos de refugiados.

Fuente: https://www.iagua.es/noticias/ep/sequia-y-conflicto-podrian-obligar-47-millones-ninos-dejar-escuela-africa

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Kenya: Climate change to be included in new education curriculum

Noticias

África /Kenya / 26.02.2018 / By: www.the-star.co.ke.

Commonwealth countries have resolved to include climate change in their curriculum from Early Childhood Education to institutions of higher learning.

In a declaration of the 20th Commonwealth Conference of Education Ministers in Nadi, Fiji, on Friday, the ministers said they will double efforts to educate present and future generations on climate change.

Speaking during the conference, Education CS Amina Mohamed said rising seas and extreme weather changes are the greatest threats facing humanity.

Mohamed, who also chaired the conference, said there was need to promote climate awareness, including through mass education beyond the classroom.

The CS called for stronger engagement with the private sector and other industry players.

The conference also called for increased awareness of green and blue technologies and emerging alternative for clean energy sources.

The ministers said progress has been made in expanding access to education. They stressed the need to improve quality of education to ensure learners master both numeracy and literacy skills.

Member states also agreed to focus on training, recruitment and motivation of teachers.

The ministers said there was need to tackle emerging challenges like employment and ensure learners get the best start in education.

The conference called on governments to invest at least four to six per cent of their GDP or between 15-20 per cent of government spending in education.

The meeting in Fiji also resolved to have Kenya host the next conference in 2021.

The conference brings together education ministers from all the 52 Commonwealth countries to discuss key issues affecting the sector.

Mohammed appreciated the decision to have Kenya host the next conference.

“I wish to confirm, with gratitude and humility, that Kenya accepts the honour of hosting the 21st CCEM. Kenya looks forward to hosting the 21st Conference of Commonwealth Education Ministers in 2021,” Mohamed said.

“We will work with the Commonwealth Secretariat to ensure that the logistical, administrative and other preparations are in place for a successful conference.»

From: https://www.the-star.co.ke/news/2018/02/26/climate-change-to-be-included-in-new-education-curriculum_c1719891.

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Kenya: Implementation of education data system reveals anomalies

Noticias

Africa /Kenya/ 19.02.2018/ By: www.businessdailyafrica.com.

The rollout and subsequent implementation of the National Education Management Information System (NEMIS) across all schools in the country has revealed gaps in our national data system that needs to be addressed urgently.

While rolling out the programme, the Ministry of Education reiterated the importance of the exercise and indicated that it would go a long way towards production of timely, accurate and reliable data.

For the first time the sector would be able to among other things track students movement along the education chain and account for every learner and resources, the ministry argued.

This is of utmost importance given the massive funding that continues to go into the education sector.

Over the past five years Kenya has continued to steadily spend about six per cent of the GDP in the sector with the figure likely to ramp upwards given the recent heavy budgetary commitments by the government. Indeed, to enable consumption of the data from schools by all relevant stakeholders, emerging challenges of integrated data management should be sorted out.

Already some teachers are reportedly grappling with cases of birth certificates entry numbers and national Identity Card numbers giving different names from the bearers and appearing as not validated by Integrated Populations Regulations System (IPRS).

Launched in 2015 IPRS was intended to store data of all Kenyans at a central location for easy electronic access by institutions, including private corporations that provide crucial and sensitive services. This would be accessed and relayed conveniently at the touch of a button.

When this cannot be accurately done, it points out to our collective ineffective use of technology at entry points of crucial processes and operations as well as inadequate skills development of the work force.

The problem seems to be originating from data entry level where any wrong data that finds itself into the registry chain snowballs into future anomalies throughout the whole system. Our national data management system should be cleaned up and full proofed so as to be able to track births and subsequent issuance of ID cards.

Whatever challenges that exist and have been unearthed are surmountable and should not diffuse the benefit that have been envisioned through the programme.

Allan Onunga, secondary school teacher.

Time to protect children from harmful content in matatus

Some of the public transport vehicles in our major towns have mounted big screens on which they show lurid music videos without caring about the ages of their passengers.

Some of their passengers are children. A series of research shows that children often imitate what they see, read, or hear. Yet children are not the only ones affected.

Exposure to pornography creates a range of devastating effects on the mental, moral and spiritual health of society as a whole in the long term.

Exposure to pornography vitiates the learning habits of children and hinders their mental growth. Images imprinted on the mind of a child at an early age often reflect on their actions later.

Screening of indecent content in PSVs go against the Films and Stage Plays Act Cap 222, the Sexual Offences Act of 2006 and Children’s Act. According to the Films and Stage Plays Act cap 222, screening of the content in the vehicles is considered a public exhibition.

Consumption of pornography is also associated with many negative emotional, psychological, and physical health outcomes.

These include increased rates of depression, anxiety, violent behaviour, younger age of sexual debut, sexual promiscuity and increased risk of teen pregnancy.

From: https://www.businessdailyafrica.com/analysis/letters/Implementation-of-education-data-system-reveals-anomalies/4307714-4309916-13aaxs5z

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Del #MeToo al poder del NO: qué nos dice Kenia sobre educar en la igualdad de género

Liliana Arroyo

Kenia / 18 de febrero de 2018 / Autor: Liliana Arroyo / Fuente: El Diario de la Educación

La prevención, mediante la formación de niñas y niños sobre abusos y violencia de género, es una clave que podríamos aprender de lugares como Kenia.

Por suerte, en 2017 las violencias y desigualdades de género se han instalado en el debate social permanente. Casos como la “manada” de los San Fermines o el movimiento #MeToo (yo también) nacido desde el universo hollywoodiense sirven para visibilizar y denunciar. Siendo una cuestión silenciada, menospreciada e infravalorada desde siempre, eso es para celebrarlo. No obstante, esas acciones de reconocimiento y confesión llegan tarde, porque contarlo es lo mejor cuando ya ha sucedido, pero lo ideal es poder evitarlo.

La prevención radica en la educación desde el respeto y la igualdad, así que cualquier pieza del engranaje educativo está invitada a sumarse. El momento de empezar es siempre y, de hecho, cuanto antes, mejor. Los abusos ocurren cuando una parte de la historia se siente más fuerte, más poderosa o con derechos superiores a la otra. La parte que lo recibe se percibe como débil e incapaz de rebelarse. Ambas partes creen que eso tiene sentido: la primera porque se siente impune, lo ve normal. La segunda porque cree que la situación es culpa suya. Después tenemos al entorno, las miradas –cómplices o ciegas– que son las que podrían identificar cuándo se pierde el respeto. Ahí hablamos del resto de alumnos y también del personal docente. Save the Children ya alertó de lo importante que es que los docentes reciban formación para prevenir abusos.

Existen muchos ejemplos y proyectos para educar en el respeto y la igualdad, pero hoy os invito a mirar hacia Kenia, donde se ha desarrollado una metodología llamada No Means No Worldwide (No significa No en todo el mundo). No olvidemos el contexto: en Kenia, los abusos sexuales se cuentan por violaciones.

El programa, desarrollado por un matrimonio estadounidense afincado en Nairiobi, consiste en un conjunto de intervenciones educativas orientadas al empoderamiento, la autodefensa y la generación de relaciones sanas. Son módulos de 12h que tres años después (comenzaron en 2015) han conseguido disminuir la tasa de violaciones a la mitad, las propias chicas han evitado el 50% de las violaciones después de recibir la formación y en 3 de cada 4 casos han sido los propios chicos los que han intervenido para prevenir el asalto. Os podéis imaginar las implicaciones personales y sociales. Sólo diremos que el embarazo no deseado tras el abuso es una de las principales razones para que las chicas abandonen la escuela.

¿Qué podemos aprender de este ejemplo inspirador y respaldado por resultados? El modelo del “No significa No” tiene tres lecciones universales:

  1. Que los módulos de sensibilización tienen que ser para niños y niñas: no tiene ningún sentido abordar sólo a una parte, cuando el acoso no es cosa de mujeres únicamente. Utilizan muchos recursos de habilidades verbales y juegos de rol para generar empatía.
  2. Se trabaja la autodefensa: pero la solución no es enseñar claves de artes marciales. La autodefensa comienza por la asertividad y el reclamo de los límites del propio espacio físico. Antes de llegar al contacto físico hay una invasión de ese terreno propio que nos rodea y reivindicarlo es también un derecho.
  3. Se dan herramientas para romper el silencio: eso pasa por denunciar, pero también se trata de prevenir o intervenir. En el caso de Kenia es muy revelador el hecho de que son los propios chicos y jóvenes los que más asaltos evitan.

Hay una cuarta lección quizá menos evidente pero igualmente necesaria: ofrecer a los chicos referentes de masculinidades positivas. Es decir, a la vez que se rompen los prejuicios, se empodera a las chicas para que el “no” sea rotundo, ellas pasan a tener voz y desencajan la sumisión. Ellos, construidos sobre la superioridad y el poder sobre otras, necesitan otros fundamentos sobre los que forjar su identidad. Y cuanto más masculinidades diferentes existan, más habrá calado el respeto.

Fuente del Artículo:

http://eldiariodelaeducacion.com/blog/2018/02/07/del-metoo-al-poder-del-no-nos-dice-kenia-educar-la-igualdad-genero/

Fuente de la Imagen:

https://www.thedailybeast.com/the-metoo-movement-shows-its-more-than-just-a-hashtag

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Kenia: New education CS to sustain reforms ministry is undertaking

Noticias

Kenia / Por: Beth Nyaga / Fuente: http://www.kbc.co.ke

The new Cabinet Secretary for Education, Ambassador Amina Mohamed has said she will sustain the reforms the Ministry is undertaking.

“We will continue to move forward with the reforms,” Ambassador Mohamed affirmed, in reference to the wide-ranging reforms initiated by her predecessor Fred Matiang’i.

“I know how much work it takes to get our reform process moving,” Ambassador Mohamed noted, saying she will provide the leadership needed to ensure full implementation of the reforms.

She made the remarks during an extensive briefing session at the Centre for Mathematics, Science and Technology Education in Africa (CEMASTEA) on Tuesday.

She was flanked by, Chief Administrator, Simon Kachapin, the Principal Secretary for State Department of Early Learning and Basic Education, Dr. Belio Kipsang and his Counterpart in University Education and Research, Prof Micheni J. Ntiba.

Ambassador Mohamed said she looked forward to the support from staff given its technical expertise, saying the Ministry and staff had a greater responsibility to impact the life of millions of children.

“We should deepen our impact and resolve to work together,” the CS noted.

Dr. Kipsang said that the Ministry was responsible to the education and training of 17 million Kenyans in basic education and tertiary institutions.

He described access, equity, quality, relevance in education and retention of learners in schools as cardinal duties for the Ministry which it ought to observe.

Dr. Kipsang, who was retained as Principal Secretary in the Ministry, said that the staff in the Ministry would give the new Cabinet Secretary all the support she needs to make a difference in the lives of our children.

Directors of various departments outlined the policies, programmes, projects and programmes the Ministry was undertaking to improve children’s access, equity, quality, relevance of education.

Ambassador Mohamed called for the series of meetings to enable her and other top leadership newly appointed leaders in the Ministry to understand the challenges and opportunities the Ministry had in providing educational services to the country.

Officers accordingly provided information regarding the policies, programmes, projects and initiatives the Ministry had developed and implementing to meet its mandate.

The Ministry of education has initiated various reforms aimed at making quality and relevant education accessible to all learners regardless of socioeconomic backgrounds of the children, gender, region or physical conditions.

It is also implementing two transformative programmes in literacy and numeracy in all public primary schools in the country, aside from facilitating changes on the education system where competence based curriculum will be implemented in 2019.

The Ministry has also cracked down on examinations cheating, introduced new textbook distribution policy, and curbed school fees which had run out of control by dint of Principals’ disregard of school fees guidelines the ministry issues.

“We are not going backwards. We shall not discuss anything discussed. Our work is going to be implementation,” she said during the handing/taking over ceremony last week.

“I will focus on building on what has been achieved and sustaining the momentum for reform in the education sector,” she noted.

She made similar affirmation on Tuesday.

The CS is set to meet the officials of the State Departments of University Education, Vocational and Technical Training on today, and thereafter, she will meet officials of the Kenya Institute of Curriculum Development, Kenya National Examinations Council before the weekends.

The CS is set to meet the officials of the State Departments of University Education, Vocational and Technical Training on today, and thereafter, she will meet officials of the Kenya Institute of Curriculum Development, Kenya National Examinations Council before the weekends.

Fuente noticia: http://www.kbc.co.ke/local-news/new-education-cs-sustain-reforms-ministry-undertaking/

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