UN Looking for Ways to Keep Girls in School

19 May 2010

At the week-long conference, participants are focusing on three primary roadblocks to getting and keeping girls in school: violence, poverty and the poor quality of education.

Scholars, aid workers, and government officials from 22 countries are in Dakar this week for the U.N. Girls' Education Initiative's global conference aimed at finding new ways to get and keep girls in school.

The UN Children's Fund estimates that nearly 72 million children of primary school age were not enrolled in school in 2007. More than half of those not in school are girls, and more than two-thirds of them are in sub-Saharan Africa and South and West Asia.

In the last decade, enrollment has increased and the gender gap in schools has closed in many regions, but UNICEF's Executive Director, Anthony Lake, says there is still much work to be done. "Unless we all work harder, there may still be 56 million children out of school in 2015. 56 million lives blighted. 56 million development opportunities wasted. All of our development work -- child survival, maternal and child health, child protection -- all of it in the most disadvantaged communities hinges on educating girls, as well as boys. It is the only way to make sustainable progress, sustainable economic development," he said.

Lake is one of 200 scholars, government officials, civil society workers and development partners in Dakar this week for a conference organized by the UN Girls' Education Initiative, an international partnership aimed at achieving gender equality and universal primary school education by 2015.