Summary of the EFA Goals

EFA Goals
Name
Course
Professor
Lecturer
October 21, 2012
Education for All Goals
Introduction
Every child has a right to access quality education just in the same manner he can access his basic needs like food and shelter. According to Article 26 of the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights, every individual has the right to education (). Education paves a way for human growth and development it is the only way a society evolves and changes for the better. For individuals who are educated many doors open expanding opportunities for growth and freedom.
The Education for All EFA Goals
Goal One Expand early childhood care and education: This is the education offered during the formative years of a child’s life. At this developmental stage, it is important to offer Early Childhood Care and education (ECCE) (portal.unesco.org). This kind of education helps a child to have positive image about the self and their immediate world. By offering education at this tender age the child is given a foundation to express themselves socially and be creative.ECCE can be termed as the rock that a child encounters in his day o day life and it can take various forms raging from care given at home, the nursery or kindergarten education experience (portal.unesco.org) is the first rock a child grapples onto from a turbulent sea of large looming objects and minute by minute existence. It can take many forms from nursery school to the education offered at Kindergarten level.
The reason why the UNESCO insisted on this goal is because through out the developing countries this kind of education has been neglected and children lack a good educational grounding as they join the mainstream schooling fraternity.
Goal Two – Universal Primary Education: The UNSECO stipulated that every child is entitled to free and obligatory quality education by the year 2015(). This in essence means that the primary education must not only be availed to the students in the primary school level but should also be quality. Through the primary education, human beings are positioned to master the basic knowledge related to the world around them, it helps people to read and write. Moreover, people become acquainted with the necessary knowledge concerning the AIDS pandemic and how to avoid it together with the other infectious diseases (Global Monitoring Report, 2008). Through this education both boys and girls will be put on the same ground and learn with similar advantages. No longer will the girl child be prejudice and offered minimal or no education like it has been the case in the moss developing countries.
Universal Primary Education (UPE) can be attained by the year 2015 if the governments of the world are wiling to put the right structures and policies in the place (Global Monitoring Report, 2008). This goal is however impeded owing to the fact that the rate of enrolling the goal is very sluggish with notable nonchalance from the governments that are unwilling to pay the price and see the change in the educational sector. UN has established that 77 million children are not in school but they are out there working owing to the harsh economic conditions in their homes (). Notably, the dropout rate is at an alarming level and yet even those who complete the school are unable to write simple text. Even though remarkable progress has been made towards UPE, there innumerable difficulties impeding the ability of the governments to offer universal quality primary education to all children. The biggest majority of the people who have not been able to access education are the young girls and the poor people living in the rural areas, where also teacher’s absenteeism is very high. (Global Monitoring Report, 2008)
Goal Three - Promote learning and life skills for young people and adults: developing an individual is a very daunting process; people cannot be development by instructions alone. Passing on knowledge is different from helping a person use the knowledge they acquire wisely. In order for students to make good use of their acquired knowledge, they must be taught life skills to tap into their full potential. Life skills affect the way a child thinks, communicates and affects the people around him (). Life skills can thus be put into four major categories namely, learning to know; learning to be; learning to live together and learning to do (Global Monitoring Report, 2008). When a person acquires life skills, they are in a position to adapt efficiently to the changing world around them by making the right decisions. Life skills such as individual self-esteem and critical thinking are hard to gauge and they solely depend on the manner through which their teachers teach students. The third goal is very critical to all the EFA goals because it sets a foundation through which a child’s behavior is developed.
Goal Four - Increase adult literacy by 50 per cent: it has been established that 781 million of the world’s populace is unable to read or write and in this group 2/3is women. The reason why the illiterate world populace is high is that they do not need the education. In order to solve this puzzle the governments of the world must be able to answer why the old people in the villages need to get formal education (). For instance the old generation could be given education that offers values in their lives such as agricultural schemes, health matters and disease avoidance, financial handling so that education offers key for survival amongst the aged people.
Goal Five - Achieve gender parity And Equality: Gender parity means that equal number of boys and girls to be enrolled in school, the UN intended to achieve this goal by the year 2005 although it was impossible owing to poor educational policies in the developing nations. This same goal also intended to achieve gender equality by the year 2015 whereby both male and female genders got access to equal opportunities in the schooling and career environment(educationforallinindia.com). Gender equality in the educational sectors demands for girls to be accorded the same access to educational opportunities just like the boys (Global Monitoring Report, 2008). Although there has been an international consensus concerning this issue so that women and men can be given equal treatment in all spheres it has been difficult to implement owing to poor governing structures and the cultural impediment commonly found in the developing nations(educationforallinindia.com). It is unfortunate but true that boys are more valued in the s...