Christina in Burkina... IN TOGO!: How's it going?

03 April 2008

How's it going?

Below, you'll find a typical conversation between me and any of my neighbour's children. Once I step outside of my courtyard, they yell and wave from across the street, down the road, a few houses over... "ça va ?" means "how's it going" in French but here is it used as both the question and the response: how's it going? Its goes! The children in my area are enthusiastic wavers. Its pretty cute. They wave and cry out to greet me from far away and then just keep greeting and waving until I am completely out of sight.

-Adjara!! Adjara!! Adjara!! Ça va?

-Bonjour les enfants... Oui, ça va bien.

-Ça va bien!

-Oui, ça va.

-Ça va.

-Merci beaucoup.

-Ca va.

-Merci beaucoup.

-Merci beaucoup.

-Ok, aurevoir, à plus, bye-bye....

-Ça va..

- ...

-Adjara!! Adjara!! Adjara!! Ca va!!??

The children in my area know by experience with me that they should speak in French. With adults I make the effort to greet them in their language, whatever that may be. With children or young girls/boys, I make the effort to greet them in French, because in theory that is what they should be learning. Of course, many of my village children are not in school because they are too young or because they have dropped out. But I always make the effort to speak to them in French as an example of the importance of learning that language.

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Facts & Figures on Girls' Ed

Out-of-school children

• There are 115 million children out of school – the majority of them, 62 million, are girls – and 77 million children not enrolled in school. The difference represents the millions of children who are enrolling in but not attending school.

• Children from the poorest household are three times less likely to be in school than their counterparts in the richest households.

Gender parity

• There are now 94 girls in primary school for every 100 boys, up from 92 in 1999.

• Of the 181 countries with 2004 data available, two thirds have achieved gender parity in primary education.

• The gender gap remains particularly large in Afghanistan (44 girls in school for every 100 boys), the Central African Republic, Chad, Niger, Pakistan and Yemen.

Illiteracy

• There are 781 million illiterate adults, two thirds of them women, worldwide.

Early childhood

• Children whose mothers have no education are more than twice as likely to be out of school as children whose mothers have some education

• In developing countries, 75 per cent of the children not in primary school have uneducated mothers

• One additional year of schooling for 1,000 women helps prevent two maternal deaths.

• Early childhood care and education establishes a solid foundation for learning and makes both girls and boys ready to attend school at the right age. It also improves parents’ and caregivers’ readiness to send their children to school by equipping them with deeper knowledge and skills.

• More girls can attend and complete school if other children they need to care for are receiving early childhood care and education; this is particularly crucial for children affected by HIV and AIDS.

HIV and AIDS

• If all children received a complete primary education, around 700,000 cases of HIV in young adults could be prevented each year.

• Women represent 62 per cent of the 15- to 24-year-olds living with HIV and AIDS globally

• The burden of AIDS care falls especially heavily on women, and can limit educational and economic opportunities for women and girls.

• Higher education levels for girls are associated with a reduced risk of HIV and other sexually transmitted infections.

• 15.2 million children under age 18 have lost one or both parents to AIDS; 12 million of these children live in sub- Saharan Africa.

Violence

• Girls between 13 and 18 years old constitute the largest group exploited in the commercial sex industry. It is estimated that around 500,000 girls below 18 are victims

of trafficking each year.

• Female genital mutilation/cutting affects 130 million girls and women globally and places 2 million at risk annually.

• In some cultures, the preference for boy children results in prenatal sex selection and infanticide of girls. In India, there are 933 Indian women for every 1,000 men,

reflecting 40 million ‘missing’ women.

Emergencies

• More than 80 per cent of the world’s 35 million refugees and displaced people are women and children.

• Emergencies put women at risk of extreme sexual violence and abuse. In Rwanda, 2,000 women, many of whom were survivors of rape, tested positive for HIV during the five years following the 1994 genocide.

In addition to its benefits for girls and women, education is a uniquely positive force with a wide-ranging impact on society and human development. Educated girls can better protect themselves against HIV, trafficking and abuse, and are more likely to grow up to have healthier families and send their children to school.

From United Nations Girls' Education Initiative