Girls' secondary education in Uganda: assessing policy within the women's empowerment framework

This paper makes the case that policies, such as the National Strategy for Girls' Education in Uganda (NSGE), intended to achieve gender equity in education for girls in developing countries, have limited relevance to, and impact on girls' actual educational experiences. Recent considerations of girls' education acknowledge that gender equity within education is more than access to schooling; it entails the cultivation of capabilities necessary for girls to participate fully, actively and equally in all aspects of their societies. Drawing on a longitudinal, ethnographic policy research case study with 15 Ugandan schoolgirls in rural Masaka District, Uganda, from August 2004 to September 2006, I explore the girls' educational experiences in relationship to the NSGE. I employ the Women's Empowerment Framework (WEF) to evaluate the NSGE with respect to the extent to which its interventions are ‘empowering’ for girls.     

A comparison of the menstruation and education experiences of girls in Tanzania,Ghana, Cambodia and Ethiopia

The barriers to menstrual hygiene management faced by adolescent schoolgirls in low-income countries are gaining interest at practice and policy levels. The challenges include inadequate water, sanitation and disposal facilities for the management of menses with privacy and dignity, and insufficient guidance to help girls feel confident in attending school during menses. The studies described here aimed to examine how menarche impacts the lives of schoolgirls in three low-income countries (Ghana, Cambodia and Ethiopia). The focus included girls’ school participation; their relationship with parents, teachers and peers; their evolving sanitation and hygiene needs; their understanding of cultural issues and taboos around menses; and what education, if any, they received prior to and during puberty. This comparative analysis was aimed at identifying similarities between the three countries that would enable the adaptation to each context of a training book on menstruation issues for girls, which was developed from a previous study conducted in Tanzania. In all three countries, participatory activities were utilised with girls and results were analysed using grounded theory. Findings included: similarities regarding the importance of culture in perpetuating negative attitudes towards menstruation, limited provision of health information and insufficient facilities within schools. Differences were revealed regarding menstrual myths, parent–child dynamics, sources of guidance and student–teacher relations. There is a critical knowledge gap around menstruation and girls’ education in these contexts that must be addressed to ensure that girls experience a positive menarche and can manage menstrual hygiene.     

National Policies on Pregnancy in Education Systems in Sub-Saharan Africa: The case of Botswana

The article critiques pregnancy policies in the education systems in sub-Saharan Africa. Policies discussed are divided into expulsion, re-entry and continuation policies. Arguing from the standpoint of theories of oppression, it is postulated that expulsion policies symbolise direct violence against girls who become pregnant and are more common in those countries with poor human rights records. Continuation and re-entry policies are prevalent in countries that have ratified the Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination Against Women and the Convention on the Rights of Children. It is argued that re-entry policies also violate girl mothers' right to education through a retreat ideology that requires temporary withdrawal of the pregnant girl from school. Moreover, gender inequalities are built into the policies and supported by traditional and institutional ideologies that make re-entry of the girl mother into the school difficult. The Botswana re-entry policy is reviewed to illustrate difficulties in the readmission of girl mothers to school.     

Sexualities,teenage pregnancy and educational life histories in Portugal: experiencing sexual citizenship?

This article focuses on Portuguese working-class teenage girls’ voices and experiences concerning sexuality and pregnancy. Within a sociological, feminist and educational framework, it explores the girls’ perspective on sexual and intimate citizenship as evidence of fairer forms of regulation of teenage sexualities. Through building life histories of three pregnant and teenage mothers, this article aims to understand how girls rehearse and live out their sexualities and pregnancies as well as listen to their voices and recognise their demand for inclusion and respect. Gender power relations emerge as central in configuring girls’ pathways and shed light on youth pregnancy.     

Forging Habsburg Muslim girls: gender,education and empire in Bosnia and Herzegovina (1878–1918)

This article explores the entanglement of gender, education and empire in Bosnia and Herzegovina during the Habsburg period throughout the analysis of a unique institution: Sarajevo’s Muslim Female School. Established at the very end of the nineteenth century, this pedagogical institution was the only school in Austria-Hungary specifically devoted to Muslim girls. The article begins by presenting the development of the Habsburg Empire’s educational policy in Bosnia after 1878 and demonstrates that it was deeply bound with its imperial ‘civilising mission’. Through an analysis of the programmes taught at Sarajevo’s Muslim Female School, the article detects the model of ‘Hapsburg Muslim femininity’ promoted by this institution. By investigating the reports the teachers sent to the authorities, it explores how this school was perceived by the Muslim population. The last section is devoted to the schoolgirls’ experience of this school, and especially to their access to the written word.     

From a ‘Sketchy Policy’ to a ‘Workable Scheme’: the DES and grant‐maintained schools

ABSTRACT

This paper examines how initial proposals for grant‐maintained (GM) schools were developed by the Department of Education and Science (DES) as it took them forward into legislation. Drawing on interviews conducted with officials involved in creating a statutory framework for GM schools, the paper addresses wider issues of policy generation including the extent to which civil servants influence the content of education policy. In the case of GM schools policy, this study suggests that the DES developed the original policy proposals in ways unforeseen by its early advocates. It concludes by reviewing the significance of recent changes to the policy and argues that these have to be interpreted in light of the government's ideological commitment to bring ‘market principles’ to the education service.     

Parental attitudes about teenage pregnancy: impact on sexual risk behaviour of African-American youth

African-American youth suffer disproportionately from sexual risk consequences including unintended pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections. Parents educating young people about sex may be one approach to reduce sexual risk behaviour among this population. The purpose of this study was to determine young people's perceptions of parents' attitudes about sex and assess whether these perceptions affect sexual risk. Data were collected from 560 African-Americans, aged 9–19 years. Most (73.4%) thought their parents would be unhappy if they got someone pregnant/got pregnant, with more girls feeling this way than boys (p = 0.013). Sexually active boys who thought their parents would be unhappy if they got someone pregnant reported fewer sexual partners within the past year (p < 0.01) and fewer sexual encounters in the past 3 months (p = 0.01) compared to those whose parents would think otherwise. Our research illustrates that parents' explicit and unstated attitudes are apparent to their offspring, and young people's perceptions can impact their risk behaviour. As such, early and often sex education communication between parents and young people should be encouraged. Sexual health interventions encouraging parents to educate about sex and its consequences could enhance the health of young African-Americans.     

Policy enacted – teachers' approaches to an outcome-based framework for course design

In this paper, we report on how teachers in Higher Education enact policy. Outcome-based education (OBE) serves as an example of a governmental educational policy introduced with the European Bologna reform. With a hermeneutic approach, we have studied how 14 teachers interpreted this policy and re-designed their courses. The findings show teachers' enactment of policy framed as different approaches to OBE: container, technocratic, pragmatic or ideological. The approaches range from being (1) highly regulated to being autonomous; and (2) from having a teacher-centred orientation to having a student-centred orientation to teaching–learning. Teachers who reinterpreted the policy to fit their learning-centred orientation used it to facilitate a joint development process together with colleagues. Thus, policy may stimulate development of teaching–learning.     

Doing ‘it’ differently: relinquishing the disease and pregnancy prevention focus in sexuality education

Despite policy provision enabling sexuality education to address more than disease and pregnancy prevention, this focus continues to permeate many school programmes. This paper problematises the danger prevention emphasis in sexuality education, examines school's investment in it and asks how useful it is. The ways this kind of sexuality education may inhibit the reduction of ‘negative’ sexual outcomes and fail to support young people's sexual well‐being is explored. Suggesting sexuality education might be conceptualisxed without this danger prevention emphasis necessitates an exploration of what might replace it. Foucault's work around an ethics of pleasure is drawn on as one example of how the objectives of sexuality education might be re‐envisaged.     

Girls' and boys' reasoning on cultural and religious practices: a human rights education perspective

Human rights play a vital role in citizens' political, religious and cultural life (Wang 2002, 171). Due to the prominence of human rights in the everyday life of citizens, including those of South Africa, human rights education has been included in many school curricula. Human rights education aims to develop responsible citizens who inter alia foster an understanding of gender, ethnical, religious and cultural diversities. This, it is hoped will encourage and maintain peace, as outlined in the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Departing from a human rights position, a qualitative study commenced in 2009 to explore how girls and boys reason about the cultural and religious practices of girls in their communities and families. Narratives by girls and boys highlighted their views on girls' positioning in their specific communities. From the findings it became evident that the participants were aware of conforming to particular cultural and religious practices. However, some participants also challenged how they perceived these practices and the roles of girls in their communities. The article highlights the necessity of embarking on a gendered perspective towards human rights education.     

‘Oh no,nothing, we didn’t learn anything’: sex education and the preparation of girls for motherhood,c.1930–1970

This article investigates how girls were educated about sex, pregnancy and childbirth during the years 1930 to 1970. Based on the results of 92 oral‐history interviews with Oxfordshire women, it explores how national debates surrounding sex education influenced what girls in Oxfordshire were taught. In addition, it examines how successful the women themselves thought this education had been in equipping them for maternity and whether they believed women could indeed be educated for motherhood.     

Girls’ higher education in India on the road to inclusiveness: on track but heading where?

The scope of this paper spans from macro-level national and inter-state comparisons to more micro-level intra-state scrutiny of systemic fault-lines shaping the contours of girls’ education in India. Post independence, national level indicators have been suggestive of greater gender parity. Yet, there is more to inclusiveness of girls in Indian higher education than increasing absolute numbers or improving gender ratios. Rising female participation has coincided with a massive ‘systemic expansion’ of delivery systems and therefore, would have to be a function of this expanded availability. As a corollary, systemic skews and limitations, both qualitative and quantitative, are bound to influence how girls get incorporated into the system. This would matter not just in terms of how many access it, but also what courses do they access and where. In the course of this paper, we scan through several geographic layers of delivery systems to surface how critical systemic traits are shaping access to higher education in India, and how girls remain particularly vulnerable to them. It reveals how the progress achieved so far has spawned its own hierarchies, which do not get reflected adequately in the national level indicators. As we scale down to states, the first set of skews begins to surface in the form of inter-state disparities of access and uneven faculty-wise distributions. Moving to the next level of geographic dis-aggregation, further skews are revealed based on availability of medium of instruction; as also the guidelines of gender based affirmative action meant for improving girls’ participation that ironically end up creating their own distortions. Through a study of these multi-layered hurdles, this paper brings forth the systemic side of impediments that have remained less explored in comparison with the cultural-attitudinal biases that have plagued girls’ participation to higher education in India.     

高职校本教材建设及其课堂教学实效性研究

高职教育发展时间短,以突破"本科压缩饼干"为目标的改革正在兴起,课程开发和教材建设只能以学校为主体,因而校本课程、校本教材必然成为当前和今后一个时期高职院校课程开发和教材建设的主流。为了保证校本教材建设的质量,应当建立校本教材教学有效性考核评价的体系与机制,建立和实行教材建设立项评审、结项验收和教学考评相结合,同行专家评审和学生评教相结合的评价体系和评价制度。按照职业性、实践性、开放性的要求,针对不同类型的课程,制订相应的评价标准。黎明职业大学经过多年的实践,初步建立了课程和教材建设立项管理和教学实效性考核的指导思想、管理办法和评价体系,在提高校本教材教学实效性方面作出了有益的探索。     

The Graduate,the Globetrotter and the Good Samaritan: adolescent girls’ visions of themselves in early adulthood

Adolescent aspirations have been extensively researched, particularly in the contexts of higher education and the workforce. This paper extends research by exploring how the educational and career aspirations of rural adolescent girls relate to their other future goals. It demonstrates how exploring aspirations, both within and outside of the contexts of higher education and the workforce, enables a deeper understanding of various adolescent aspirations and the interconnections between them. This paper draws on a qualitative study with adolescent girls living in the Cradle Coast region of Tasmania-a rural and remote region where access to a wide range of educational resources and experiences is limited in comparison to those available in metropolitan centres. The paper responds to recent participation policy in Australia that implies young people from rural locations are lacking in aspiration. The article demonstrates that despite rurality, the girls in this study have many aspirations, including those for higher education. It discusses how having many and quite varied aspirations influences the girls’ decision making and planning around their futures. The paper shows that it is the balancing of many future goals that influences educational and career decision-making, rather than low aspirations.     

Poverty and Childhood∗

ABSTRACT

The child‐centred theme of natural development in Rousseau's Emile has exercised a powerful and benign influence on education. Rousseau's proposed curriculum for girls, however, seems extraordinarily illiberal, requiring as it does a rigorous preparation for playing the traditional female role in a male‐dominated society.

It is argued here that such a conservative policy on the education of girls is inevitable in an educational theory which makes a virtue of its empirical foundations. Observational studies of the female's nature and of her needs and interests portray her as society permits or requires her to be rather than as she could or should be. This is a dangerous weakness in influential twentieth‐century versions of child‐centred theory which have embraced a scientific approach in the hope of enhancing their credibility. The full educational development of girls, however, requires a distinctive vision of how things ought to be, a willingness to defend such value judgments, and a determination to intervene positively in the classroom.     

“Double-Dose” Algebra as an Alternative Strategy to Remediation: Effects on Students' Academic Outcomes

Abstract

Expanded instructional time has become increasingly popular as a strategy to improve the academic outcomes of low-skilled students, particularly in the 9th grade. We evaluate the efficacy of a double-period algebra policy initiated in the Chicago Public Schools in 2003. This policy required all students with 8th-grade test scores below the national median to enroll in a support algebra course in addition to regular algebra in the 9th grade. Using regression discontinuity combined with interrupted time series designs, and instrumental variable models, we show the effects of the policy on students' grades, failure rates and test scores in 9th-grade algebra and 10th-grade geometry. Providing support courses improved algebra test scores for the target population but only modestly affected grades and failure rates. Students with very low initial abilities benefited less than students close to the national median. The policy also led schools to track algebra classes by students' entering math skills. As a result, it affected academic outcomes among students not targeted by the policy; test scores among high-ability students improved whereas their grades declined.     

Global campaigns for girls’ and women’s education, 2000–2017: insights from transnational social movement theory

ABSTRACT

Recent decades have witnessed a growing number of global campaigns on girls’ and women’s education, including major global policy initiatives such as the MDGs and the SDGs. While scholars have critically analysed the conceptualisations of gender, equality and development in such campaigns, and their significance for national level policy and practice, less has been written about why and how girls’ education came to be such a high profile feature of international policy frameworks. This paper draws on perspectives from transnational social movement theory, which has been used by gender scholars to explore the activities and significance of non-governmental organisations for agenda-setting at the global level. In this paper these perspectives are applied to the field of global education policy, through an analysis of evidence from international conferences, data on aid flows and interviews with key policy actors, to explore the factors behind rise of the global agenda on gender equality in education. In doing so, it suggests that the current dominant framing around girls’ education, access and quality, may be explained by the relatively weak involvement of non-governmental women’s groups in proportion to the strong involvement of multilaterals, bilateral agencies, national governments and more recently, private sector organisations.     

Back to basics: how young mothers learn about sex and sexuality

Adolescent pregnancy continues to be a major concern for policy-makers, programme developers, helping professionals and society generally in the USA, especially in light of the US federal government's legislative emphasis on abstinence-only sex education until recently. Studies have found that abstinence-only programmes do not succeed in preventing young people from becoming sexually active or pregnant; most young people have sexual intercourse in their teenage years long before they even contemplate marriage. The purpose of this qualitative study was to explore how 32 teenage mothers learned about sex and their related views about pregnancy and birth control. Findings indicate that they have often received little accurate information about sex from their parents and schools. Findings also reveal their widely varying views about birth control and pregnancy. Overall, the findings support the need for comprehensive sexuality education that addresses the topics covered in this study in an age-appropriate manner. The findings also suggest ways that helping professionals in other settings besides schools can help young people address these issues.     

Boys as only‐children and girls as only‐children—parental gendered expectations of the only‐child in the nuclear Chinese family in present‐day China

Studies on the effect of only‐child status on girls’ education indicate that the only‐child policy has had an unintended consequence of engendering a child‐centered culture with a strong belief and shared interest among the urban community in educating the only‐child regardless of the child’s sex. As the distribution of education by sex is frequently argued to be a key determinant for gender inequality, this finding seems to carry an unquestioned message that gender equality has been largely achieved for the only‐child generation. So far, however, few studies have examined parental gender‐specific expectations for their only children as an important factor in preparing boys and girls for their different school and social experiences. Based on data collected through semi‐structured interviews with 20 families in north China, this paper explores parental gender‐specific expectations of their only‐children. Parents’ SES is also considered in order to see how class may interact with gender in parents’ expectations for boys and girls as only‐children. The study reveals patterns of differences in parental expectations based on gender, and to a lesser degree, class. The author argues that it would be over‐optimistic to believe that only‐child status and the equally high academic aspirations parents hold for boys and girls have done away with all the deep‐rooted factors against gender equality in Chinese society. Drawing on Bourdieu’s social theory, the author discusses the implications of the findings and provides suggestions for policy efforts and further research.     

The Labour Market of Schooling: Maltese girls in education and economic planning

This article uses the case of Maltese girls and women to examine the relationship between schooling and the economy. It is clear that not only have education and economic planners sought to strengthen the links between school and work in planning for different courses for children of different sexes, but also that the allocation of pupils to subjects has in itself worked as a labour market. Interestingly, private schools have also responded to their interpretations of labour market demand in producing feminised choices for girls. Some Maltese girls do achieve well, compared both to Maltese boys and their European counterparts. This is largely due to a combination of single‐sex and selective secondary education. Nevertheless, these same girls continue to have lower and feminised occupational aspirations which mirror the job opportunities in the labour market. Others are incapacitated by their schooling and have until recently been channelled into the labour intensive jobs on which Malta's economy depended in the first phase of industrialisation in the 1960s and 1970s. Of late it seems as if rising educational standards and social awareness (propagated by women's organisations) have led to reluctance on the part of these girls and women to participate in the same way in the workforce. With struggle, the needs of patriarchy and capitalism will not always be perfectly served.