24 December 2006

"The State of the World's Children 2007" by UNICEF: Gender disparity in primary and secondary school

Cover of The State of the World's Children 2007 by UNICEFOn 11 December 2006, UNICEF released the 2007 edition of its annual publication The State of the World's Children. This year's report, with the title Women and children: The double dividend of gender equality, looks at the status of women today and discusses how gender equality can help achieve the UN Millennium Development Goals.

The report argues that gender equality produces a double dividend because it benefits both women and children. Healthy, educated and empowered women have healthy, educated and confident children. Through gender equality women can not only live full and productive lives, they can also improve the lives of their children, their families, and the society they are part of.

The State of the World's Children contains detailed statistical tables with data on health, nutrition, HIV/AIDS, education, demographics, economy, women, and child protection for each country. In the area of education, the report lists data for the following indicators:
  • Literacy
  • Primary school enrollment and attendance
  • Secondary school enrollment and attendance
  • Survival rate to grade 5
Data on primary and secondary school enrollment shows that gender disparity continues to exist in most regions of the world. The graph below compares female and male enrollment rates by expressing the female gross enrollment rate (GER) as a percentage of the male GER. The primary school GER is calculated as follows:
  • Primary school gross enrollment rate (GER) = Number of children enrolled in primary school / Number of children of official primary school age
By definition, the GER can exceed 100 percent. This can be the case in countries where many children enter school late or where many children repeat a grade. However, the GER is frequently used to assess a country's education system because it measures the participation of all children, not only those of official primary or secondary school age (see primary school gross and net enrollment). The GER ratio is calculated as follows:
  • Female GER as a percent of male GER = 100 * (Female GER / Male GER)
A value of 100 percent means that the enrollment rates of girls and boys are at the same level and that gender parity has been reached. If the ratio is below 100 percent, fewer girls than boys are in school. If the ratio is above 100 percent, more girls than boys are in school. The ratio of female to male enrollment rates is also known as the gender parity index.

Note that the reported values contain no information about the absolute level of school enrollment. It is possible to have gender parity at very low enrollment levels. Take a country where 50 percent of boys and 50 percent of girls attend primary school. Although the country would be far from the Millennium Development Goal of universal primary education, there would be gender parity in primary school. For data on absolute enrollment levels refer to an earlier post on primary school enrollment in 2004, with the most recent data from the UNESCO Institute for Statistics.

Primary and secondary school gross enrollment ratios: female GER as a percent of male GER, 2000-2005
Bar graph with female gross enrolment ratios as a percentage of male gross enrolment ratios, 2000-2005
Data source: UNICEF. 2006. The state of the world's children 2007: Women and children - The double dividend of gender equality. New York: UNICEF. Table 8, page 133.

According to the data reported by UNICEF, only two regions have achieved gender parity in both primary and secondary school: East Asia and the Pacific, and the industrialized countries. The countries of Central and Eastern Europe and the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) are close to gender parity, with female enrollment rates at 95 to 97 percent of male enrollment rates. Latin America and the Caribbean are close to gender parity in primary school but in secondary school, the female GER far exceeds the male GER (gender parity index 108 percent), which means that more girls than boys continue their education past primary school.

In the Middle East and North Africa, the female GER is at 93 percent of the male GER in primary school and at 90 percent in secondary school. In the three remaining regions, there is a larger drop in the gender parity index from primary to secondary school. In Eastern and Southern Africa, almost as many girls as boys are enrolled in primary school (gender parity index 94 percent) but at the secondary level of education, the female GER is only 85 percent of the male GER. In South Asia, the gender parity index is 91 percent in primary school and 83 percent in secondary school.

In West and Central Africa, girls are furthest behind boys in terms of school enrollment. The gender parity index is 84 percent in primary school and 70 percent in secondary school. In addition, total enrollment rates are lower than in any other region of the world (see primary school enrollment in 2004 and primary school enrollment in 2002/03). Compared to boys and compared to girls in other region, girls from West and Central Africa are least likely to reap the benefits of a formal school education.

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07 December 2006

Years of schooling and literacy, part 2

The Education for All Global Monitoring Report 2007 assesses individual countries' progress toward the goal of basic education for all children and adults by 2015 with the EFA Development Index (EDI). One component of the EDI is the adult literacy rate. In countries where the adult literacy rate is not available, the EDI is calculated with a proxy measure: the share of the adult population with at least a complete primary education (UNESCO 2006, p. 201, note 2).

A previous article on this site, "Years of schooling and literacy: Can everyone with primary education read and write?", analyzed data on years of schooling and literacy from 26 household surveys in Sub-Saharan Africa. The results showed that most persons who graduated from primary school or attended higher levels of education can indeed be considered literate and that the share of the adult population with at least a complete primary education is therefore a suitable proxy for the adult literacy rate.

The present article extends the analysis from Sub-Saharan Africa to 19 additional countries from Latin America, North Africa, Asia, and Eastern Europe. The data, collected between 1998 and 2004, is from 15 Multiple Indicator Cluster Surveys (MICS) funded by UNICEF, and 4 Demographic and Health Surveys (DHS) funded by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). The surveys and data collection methods are described in detail in the previous article with literacy data from Sub-Saharan Africa.

For the analysis that follows, household members in each survey dataset were divided into 13 groups according to the highest grade of formal education completed: no formal education, grade 1 completed, grade 2 completed, ..., grade 11 completed, and grade 12 or higher completed. Within each group, the share of literate persons was calculated. The results are plotted in the graphs below.

For the presentation of the results, countries are grouped according to the geographic regions used by UNICEF. The first graph shows data from 5 countries in Latin America and the Caribbean. For each country, a line indicates how the percentage of literate persons varies with the completed years of formal education. In Suriname, for example (the orange line in the graph), 17 percent of all persons without formal education are literate, compared to 46 percent of those who completed the first grade, 67 percent of those who completed the second grade, and so on. The number in parentheses behind the name of each country indicates the official length of primary education in years. For example, primary school has six grades in Bolivia and eight grades in the Dominican Republic.

The available data for Latin American and the Caribbean shows that the education systems in this region perform very well in terms of literacy. Literacy rates increase steadily with increasing years of education and by the time children complete primary school, close to 100 percent can read and write.

Years of education and literacy in Latin America and the Caribbean
Line graph showing link between years of eduation and literacy rate in Latin America and the Caribbean
Data source: 3 DHS and 2 MICS surveys, 1999-2004. - Number after country name indicates official duration of primary education.

The second graphs shows data from 6 countries in Central and Eastern Europe and the Commonwealth of Independent States. In contrast to Latin America and the Caribbean, completion of primary school does not guarantee literacy. In Tajikistan, only 87 percent of those with complete primary education can be considered literate. In Azerbaijan and Moldova, literacy rates are 93 to 94 percent after graduation from the last grade of primary school. The low literacy rate among persons with four years of education in Uzbekistan is an outlier caused by a skewed age distribution. This group includes a high share of persons above 60 years of age who left school after completing primary school and who have relatively low literacy levels compared to other groups. In all countries literacy levels are near 100 percent once a person has 8 or more years of education.

Years of education and literacy in Central and Eastern Europe and the Commonwealth of Independent States
Line graph showing link between years of eduation and literacy rate in Central and Eastern Europe and the Commonwealth of Independent States
Data source: 6 MICS surveys, 2000. - Number after country name indicates official duration of primary education.

The last graph combines 8 countries from 3 UNICEF regions: the Middle East and North Africa, South Asia, and East Asia. The results are similar to those for Latin America and the Caribbean. Virtually all children who graduate from primary school can read and write. Even in Iraq, the country with the slowest increase in literacy rates according to the highest grade completed, 99 percent of primary school graduates could read and write (the data for Iraq was collected in 2000, before the current war).

Years of education and literacy in East Asia, South Asia, and the Middle East and North Africa
Line graph showing link between years of eduation and literacy rate in East Asia, South Asia, and the Middle East and North Africa
Data source: 1 DHS and 7 MICS surveys, 1998-2003. - Number after country name indicates official duration of primary education.

To summarize, in most countries completion of primary school provides students with the necessary reading and writing skills. There are exceptions, especially in some former states of the Soviet Union (see above) and in parts of West and Central Africa (see the previous article), where additional years of education are needed to guarantee literacy. In spite of these limitations, the share of the population with at least a complete primary education can be considered a good indicator for the adult literacy rate.

References
  • UNESCO. 2006. Education for All Global Monitoring Report 2007: Strong foundations - Early childhood care and education. Paris: UNESCO.
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26 November 2006

Years of schooling and literacy: Can everyone with primary education read and write?

The 2007 edition of the Education for All Global Monitoring Report was released by UNESCO in October 2006. The report assesses progress toward the goal of basic education for all children and adults by 2015 with the EFA Development Index (EDI). A previous article on this site describes how the EDI is calculated.

One component of the EDI is the adult literacy rate. The adult literacy rate usually indicates the share of literate persons in the population aged 15 years and older. In countries, where the literacy rate is not available, a proxy measure is substituted for the calculation of the EDI. This proxy measure is the share of the adult population with at least a complete primary education (UNESCO 2006, p. 201, note 2).

To evaluate whether this proxy is indeed a good substitute for the adult literacy rate, it is necessary to know if all children with a complete primary education can in fact be considered literate. Various household surveys collect data on literacy, among them the Multiple Indicator Cluster Surveys (MICS) funded by UNICEF, and the Demographic and Health Surveys (DHS) funded by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID).

Previous MICS surveys collected data on literacy by asking household members aged 15 years and older if they can read a letter or newspaper easily, with difficulty, or not at all (UNICEF 2000, model questionnaire, p. Q.3). Previous DHS surveys asked if a person can read and write in any language without any difficulty (e.g., NSEO Eritrea and ORC Macro 2003, Appendix E, p. 263). More recent surveys, including the latest MICS surveys conducted in 2005 and 2006, use a more direct approach than self-assessment. Household members are shown a card with a simple sentence and are asked to read it. Example sentences are "The child is reading a book," "The rains came late this year," or "Farming is hard work" (UNICEF 2006, Appendix 2, p. A2.14).

This article examines data from 4 DHS and 22 MICS surveys in Sub-Saharan Africa that collected data on literacy with one of the methods described above. The 26 surveys were conducted between 1999 and 2004. In addition to literacy, the surveys also identified the highest level of education of each household member at least 5 or 6 years old. For the analysis, household members were divided into 13 groups according to the highest grade of formal education completed: no formal education, grade 1 completed, grade 2 completed, ..., grade 11 completed, and grade 12 or higher completed. Within each group, the share of literate persons was calculated. The results are plotted in the graphs below.

To reduce the number of countries in a graph, the countries were grouped according to the geographic regions used by UNICEF. The first graph shows 11 countries in Eastern and Southern Africa. For each country, a line indicates how the percentage of literate persons varies with the completed years of formal education. For example, in Kenya (the red line in the graph), 11 percent of all persons without formal education are literate, compared to 36 percent of those who completed the first grade, 49 percent of those who completed the second grade, and so on. The number in parentheses behind the name of each country indicates the official length of primary education in years. For example, primary school has four grades in Angola and six grades in Burundi.

The theory underlying the EFA Development Index assumes that all persons with a complete primary education are literate. The graph for Eastern and Southern Africa shows that this is mostly true. In Angola, Comoros, Somalia, and Swaziland, the literacy rate of persons who did not continue their education after completing primary school ranges from 95 to 97 percent and with additional years of education the literacy rate increases further. In Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Lesotho, Mozambique, and Rwanda, the literacy rate of persons with primary education only is 99 to 100 percent. Burundi is an exception; here, the literacy rate of persons with 6 years of education (the official length of primary school) is only 90 percent. Closer inspection of the data shows that this is due to relatively high illiteracy among the older population, who attended school more than 20 years ago. For persons with 7 or more years of education, the literacy rate approaches 100 percent in Burundi.

Years of education and literacy in Eastern and Southern Africa
Line graph showing link between years of eduation and literacy rate in Eastern and Southern Africa
Data source: 3 DHS and 8 MICS surveys, 1999-2004. - Number after country name indicates official duration of primary education.

The second graph displays the link between years of schooling and literacy in 15 countries from West and Central Africa. A comparison of the two graphs reveals a striking difference between the two regions. In Eastern and Southern Africa, a literacy rate of more than 80 percent is reached after 4 years of education; after 5 years, at least 90 percent of the population are literate. In West and Central Africa, only 6 of 15 countries have at least 80 percent literacy after 4 years of education. A 90 percent literacy rate is only reached after 7 to 8 years of school, and in Gambia, 9 years are needed to reach the same goal.

Years of education and literacy in West and Central Africa
Line graph showing link between years of eduation and literacy rate in West and Central Africa
Data source: 1 DHS and 14 MICS surveys, 2000-2003. - Number after country name indicates official duration of primary education.

Overall, the literacy rates of persons with no more than primary education are much lower than in Eastern and Southern Africa. The lowest literacy rates among primary school graduates are observed in Gambia (71 percent), Sierra Leone (80 percent), and Nigeria (82 percent). In Chad, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Guinea, Niger, and Senegal, the literacy rate of persons with primary education only ranges from 90 to 94 percent. In the Central African Republic and Côte d'Ivoire, the literacy rate of primary school graduates is 96 percent; in Equatorial Guinea it is 98 percent; and in Cameroon, Guinea-Bissau, Sao Tome and Principe, and Togo, 99 percent of primary school graduates are literate.

The analysis of years of schooling and corresponding literacy rates underlines the relatively poor state of the education system in many parts of West and Central Africa. Compared to other regions, countries in West and Central Africa not only have the lowest school attendance or enrollment rates on average, children also take longer to learn basic skills like reading and writing.

Returning to the question asked at the beginning of this article, is the share of the adult population with at least a complete primary education a suitable proxy for the adult literacy rate? The evidence from Sub-Saharan Africa shows that this indicator is not perfect, especially in countries where schools struggle to provide a high-quality education for all students. Yet, in spite of these limitations, most persons who graduated from primary school or attended higher levels of education can be considered literate. The share of the population with at least a complete primary education is therefore a good substitute for the adult literacy rate.

Correction, 7 December 2006: An earlier version of this article included data for Madagascar. All references to Madagascar were removed because the Madagascar 2000 MICS, on which the analysis was based, only provides data on education for persons up to 17 years of age. The literacy data is therefore not representative for the entire population of Madagascar.

References
  • National Statistics and Evaluation Office (NSEO) [Eritrea] and ORC Macro. 2003. Eritrea Demographic and Health Survey 2002. Calverton, Maryland: National Statistics and Evaluation Office and ORC
    Macro.
  • UNESCO. 2006. Education for All Global Monitoring Report 2007: Strong foundations - Early childhood care and education. Paris: UNESCO.
  • UNICEF. 2000. End-decade Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey manual: Monitoring progress toward the goals of the 1990 World Summit for Children. New York: UNICEF.
  • UNICEF. 2006. Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey manual 2005: Monitoring the situation of children and women. New York: UNICEF.
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14 November 2006

EFA Development Index: Assessing progress toward Education for All

Cover of the Education for All Global Monitoring Report 2007On 26 October 2006, UNESCO released the 2007 edition of the Education for All Global Monitoring Report. The annual EFA report assesses progress toward the goal of basic education for all children and adults by 2015. Individual countries are ranked with the EFA Development Index (EDI) that provides information for four of the six EFA goals:
  • Universal primary education
  • Adult literacy
  • Gender parity
  • Quality of education
Not covered in the EDI are two less easily quantifiable EFA goals:
  • Early childhood care and education
  • Learning needs of youth and adults
The EDI is calculated by taking the arithmetic mean of its four components:
  • Total primary net enrollment ratio (NER), the percentage of children of primary school age who are enrolled in primary or secondary school.
  • Adult literacy rate. In countries without data on adult literacy, the share of the adult population with at least complete primary education is used as a proxy.
  • Gender-specific EFA index (GEI). The GEI is a composite index that is calculated as the simple average of three gender parity indices (GPI):
    • GPI for the gross enrolment ratio (GER) in primary education: GPI = female GER / male GER.
    • GPI for the GER in secondary education: GPI = female GER / male GER.
    • GPI for the adult literacy rate: GPI = female literacy rate / male literacy rate.
    • If the calculation method for one of the three GPIs yields a value above 1 (because the female GER is greater than the male GER, or because the female literacy rate is greater than the male literacy rate), the calculation method is reversed. In such cases, the GPI is calculated as male GER / female GER, or as male literacy rate / female literacy rate.
  • Survival rate to grade 5 as a proxy indicator for the quality of education. The survival rate to grade 5 is the share of children entering grade 1 of primary school who eventually reach grade 5, with or without repeating a grade.
All four components of the EDI and the EDI itself have a theoretical range from 0 to 100% or, when expressed as a ratio, from 0 to 1. The complete set of indicators required to calculate the EDI was only available for 125 countries. The EDI for these 125 countries is indicated in the map below. The countries are divided into three groups:
  • High EDI: 0.95 or more
  • Medium EDI: 0.80 - 0.94
  • Low EDI: less than 0.80
EFA development index, 2004
Map of the world with EFA Development Index, 2004
Data source: UNESCO. 2006. Education for All Global Monitoring Report 2007: Strong foundations - Early childhood care and education. Paris: UNESCO. Table 1, pages 200-201.

Of the 125 countries with data, 47 have a high EDI, which means they are close to or have already reached the goal of basic education for all children and adults. This group includes virtually all countries in Europe, as well as Armenia, Bahrain, Barbados, Chile, China, Costa Rica, Cuba, Fiji, Israel, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Netherlands Antilles, Seychelles, South Korea, Tajikistan, and Trinidad and Tobago.

49 countries have a medium EDI between 0.80 and 0.94. This group includes most countries in Latin America and some countries in Africa and Asia.

Finally, 29 countries have a low EDI of less than 0.80. The twelve countries with the lowest EDI are all located in Sub-Saharan Africa. The lowest scoring countries are Chad (0.43), Niger (0.50), Burkina Faso (0.51), Mali (0.53), and Guinea (0.58). Countries with a low EDI outside of Africa include Bangladesh, Cambodia, Djibouti, India, Lao PDR, Nepal, and Saudi Arabia.

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27 October 2006

Final release of data from UNESCO's 2005 education survey

The UNESCO Institute for Statistics (UIS) has announced the final release of data from its 2005 education survey. The data, an update of the initial release from April 2006, can be downloaded from the UIS education database. I used the data to update two recent posts on primary school enrollment in 2004 and on trends in primary school enrollment from 1970 to 2004.

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28 September 2006

Trends in primary school enrollment, 1970-2004

The latest data released by the UNESCO Institute for Statistics (UIS) shows that the world has come closer than ever to the goal of universal primary education. In 2004, the global primary school net enrollment rate (NER) was at 86%. This means that worldwide almost 9 out of 10 children of primary school age are enrolled in primary school. A comparison of national enrollment rates shows that many countries in Sub-Saharan Africa continue to lag behind countries in other regions.

With enrollment data from UNESCO for the years since 1970 it is possible to assess how much progress has been made over the past decades. The graph below compares the primary NER trends for boys and girls by Millennium Development Goal (MDG) region. For the graph, the MDG regions South-eastern Asia and Oceania were combined in one region, as were Northern Africa and Western Asia.

Primary school net enrollment rate (NER), 1970-2004
Graphs with regional trends in primary school enrollment rates from 1970 to 2004
Data sources: (1) UNESCO Institute for Statistics, global education database, October 2006; (2) UNESCO Institute for Statistics, pre-1998 database, March 2005.

At the global level, shown in the lower right corner of the graph, there has been a steady increase in the primary NER of boys and girls since 1970. In addition, the gap between boys and girls has shrunk significantly. The male primary NER for 2004 is 88% and the female NER is 84%.

A comparison of regional trends shows clear differences in participation in primary education. In the developed countries, the primary school NER has been close to 100% for more than three decades. In Eastern Asia, enrollment rates were similarly high since 1970, with small up- and downturns. For the countries in the Commonwealth of Independent States, only post-Soviet data is available, showing a decline of the NER to about 90% in 2004. In South-eastern Asia and Oceania, the primary NER has been above 90% since the early 1980s. In Latin America and the Caribbean, gender parity in primary education has existed since 1970, and enrollment rates have increased steadily to an average primary NER of 94% in 2004.

Southern Asia, and Northern Africa and Western Asia stand out as regions where the education of girls has seen dramatic improvements. However, the primary NER of girls continues to be below that of boys, with a gender gap of about 6% in these regions. The enrollment rates of boys have also steadily increased over the past three decades. In 2004, the average primary NER for boys and girls combined was 87% in Southern Asia and 90% in Northern Africa and Western Asia.

Sub-Saharan Africa also witnessed a decrease in the gender gap since 1970 but overall enrollment rates stagnated below 60% throughout the 1980s and 1990s. Since 2000, there has been an improvement in primary school enrollment rates, due to renewed efforts to bring all children into school. By 2004, the primary NER of boys has risen to 70% and the NER of girls is at 65%.

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07 September 2006

Primary school enrollment in 2004

At the United Nations Millennium Summit in 2000, all UN member states agreed on a set of eight Millennium Development Goals (MDG) that should be reached by 2015. One of the goals aims at universal primary education by 2015, another goal at the elimination of gender disparity at all levels of education by 2015.

The UNESCO Institute for Statistics (UIS) maintains an annually updated database with education statistics. With the help of this database, it is possible to track the progress toward the MDGs related to education. The latest statistics on primary school enrollment rates were released in September. The map below shows the primary school net enrollment rate (NER) in each country. The primary NER is defined as the share of children of primary school age who are enrolled in primary school.
  • Primary school net enrollment rate (NER) = Number of children of primary school age enrolled in primary school / Number of children of primary school age
For 127 of 165 countries with data, the NER in 2004 is listed in the UIS database. 7 countries have data for 2005, 14 countries have data for 2003, and 17 countries have data from the years 1999 to 2002. For 42 countries in the UIS database no primary school net enrollment rate is listed, including 12 countries with a total population of more than 10 million in 2005: China, Germany, Thailand, Democratic Republic of Congo, Afghanistan, Uganda, Uzbekistan, North Korea, Cameroon, Chile, Angola, and the Czech Republic.

For all countries with data, the primary NER is indicated in the map below. Outside of Africa, most countries have NER values above 80 percent. In 7 countries, all in Africa or the Middle East, less than half of all primary-age children are enrolled in primary school: Djibouti (primary NER 32%), Niger (39%), Burkina Fast (41%), Sudan (43%), Guinea-Bissau (45%), Eritrea (46%), and Mali (47%).

Primary school net enrollment rate (NER), 2004
Map of the world with primary school net enrollment rates in 2004
Data source: UNESCO Institute for Statistics, global education database, October 2006.

The table below lists the average primary school NER at the level of the 10 Millennium Development Goal regions. To calculate the regional averages, the primary NER in each country was weighted by the country's population of primary school age. To calculate the average enrollment rate in Sub-Saharan Africa, for example, the primary NER in Nigeria (60%, 21.6 million children of primary school age in 2005) therefore has a greater weight than the primary NER in Sao Tome and Principe (98%, 23,000 children of primary school age in 2005).

Primary school net enrollment rate, 2004
MDG regionNER (%)Gender disparity
TotalMaleFemaleDifference male-
female		GPI female/
male
Developed countries95.9 96.6 95.1 1.5 0.98
Commonwealth of Independent States 89.6 89.7 89.4 0.3 1.00
Eastern Asia98.6 98.8 98.4 0.4 1.00
South-eastern Asia93.6 94.5 93.1 1.4 0.99
Oceania 86.4 86.8 85.5 1.3 0.98
Southern Asia 87.1 90.1 83.9 6.2 0.93
Western Asia83.1 87.2 78.8 8.4 0.90
Northern Africa93.7 95.2 92.2 3.0 0.97
Sub-Saharan Africa67.2 69.6 64.7 4.9 0.92
Latin America and the Caribbean 94.0 94.4 94.3 0.1 1.00
World 86.0 87.8 83.7 4.1 0.95
GPI: gender parity index. - Data source: UNESCO Institute for Statistics, Global Education Database, October 2006.

In 6 of the 10 regions, the primary school NER is at or above 90%: developed countries (96%), Commonwealth of Independent States (90%), Eastern Asia (99%), South-eastern Asia (94%), Northern Africa (94%), and Latin America and the Caribbean (94%). In Oceania, the NER is 86%, in Southern Asia it is 87%, and in Western Asia 83%. In Sub-Saharan Africa, far fewer children go to school; in this region, the primary NER is 67%. At the global level, the primary school net enrollment rate is 86%.

In addition to the total NER, the table also lists the enrollment rates of boys and girls. In the last two columns, the difference between the male and female NER, and the gender parity index (GPI) are shown. The GPI is the ratio of the female to the male NER. If the GPI is below 1, more boys than girls are enrolled in school. According to UNESCO, a GPI between 0.98 and 1.02 is interpreted as gender parity. Of the 10 regions, 6 have already reached the Millennium Development Goal of gender parity: developed countries, Commonwealth of Independent States, Eastern Asia, South-eastern Asia, Oceania, and Latin America and the Caribbean. In Southern Asia (GPI 0.93), Western Asia (0.90), Northern Africa (0.97), and Sub-Saharan Africa (0.92), the enrollment of girls is lagging behind that of boys.

To summarize, countries in Sub-Saharan Africa face the greatest challenges on the path to reaching the Millennium Development Goals of universal primary education and gender parity. Southern and Western Asia have higher enrollment rates but are not close to the goal of gender parity.

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20 August 2006

Millennium Development Goal regions and UNICEF regions

This site presents education statistics from the perspective of the United Nations Millennium Development Goals (MDG). The second of the eight Millennium Development Goals calls for universal primary education by 2015. The third MDG calls for the elimination of gender disparity in primary and secondary education by 2005 and at all levels of education by 2015.

To monitor progress toward the eight MDG, the UN has divided all countries into ten regional groupings, shown in the map below. The list of countries within each region is available on the official UN site for the MDG indicators. The abbreviations in the map's legend stand for these regions:
  • Developed countries (DEV)
  • Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS)
  • Eastern Asia (EA)
  • South-eastern Asia (SEA)
  • Oceania (OCE)
  • Southern Asia (SA)
  • Western Asia (WA)
  • Northern Africa (NA)
  • Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA)
  • Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC)
Millennium Development Goal regions
Map of the world with Millennium Development Goal regions
Source: UN Statistics Division web site, August 2006

Future posts on global education statistics will refer to the MDG regions for regionally disaggregated data. In previous posts, for example on primary school enrollment, global education statistics were presented with the regional groupings used by UNICEF. UNICEF divides all countries into eight regions, shown in the following map. The countries within each region are listed on the UNICEF web site.

UNICEF regions
Map of the world with UNICEF regions
Source: UNICEF web site, August 2006

The abbreviations stand for these regions:
  • Industrialized countries (IND)
  • Central and Eastern Europe, Commonwealth of Independent States (CEE/CIS)
  • East Asia and the Pacific (EAP)
  • South Asia (SA)
  • Middle East and North Africa (MENA)
  • Eastern and Southern Africa (ESA)
  • West and Central Africa (WCA)
  • Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC)
A comparison of the two maps shows that UNICEF combines three MDG regions (Eastern Asia, South-eastern Asia, Oceania) in a larger region called East Asia and the Pacific. Northern Africa is combined with Western Asia, Iran, and Sudan in the UNICEF region Middle East and North Africa. On the other hand, the MDG refer to one region for Sub-Saharan Africa, while UNICEF divides this region into Eastern and Southern Africa, and West and Central Africa. Three other regions are largely identical: the developed or industrialized countries, the Commonwealth of Independent States, and Latin America and the Caribbean.

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31 July 2006

Child labor and school attendance in Bolivia, part 2

Child labor interferes with school attendance and is therefore an obstacle to the Millennium Development Goal of universal primary education. In Bolivia, 90 percent of all children between 5 and 14 years of age attend school. At the same time, one third of all children in this age group are engaged in child labor, as shown in a previous post on child labor and school attendance in Bolivia.

For the purpose of this analysis, child labor is defined as any economic activity during the week of the survey, or more than two hours of household chores per day. The data for Bolivia were collected in a Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey (MICS) in 2000. The previous post presented the data on child labor and schooling disaggregated by age group, sex, area of residence, and household wealth. Today's article will take a closer look at the pattern of work and school attendance by age.

The graph belows present the share of children aged 5 to 14 years who attend school or are engaged in child labor. School attendance is defined as attending any level of education at the time of the MICS survey. Each point represents children of a single age, from 5 years, 6 years, and so on, to 14 years of age. Child labor rates are plotted against the horizontal axis, school attendance rates against the vertical axis.

Child labor and school attendance by age, children 5-14 years, Bolivia
Scatter plot with child labor and school attendance rates by age, Bolivia 2000
Data source: Bolivia 2000 MICS.

The upper left quadrant shows the values for all children combined. The inverted U shape indicates that children work steadily more as they grow older, while school attendance rates reach a peak near 100 percent for children between 7 and 11 years of age and then decrease again. The upper right quadrant, with data disaggregated by gender, makes clear that there is no difference between boys and girls in Bolivia, as far as work and school are concerned.

There are, however, big differences between children from urban and rural areas, as the lower left quadrant shows. Among urban children, school attendance rates rise rapidly with age and at 7 years, 99 percent of all children are in school. Few children drop out as they grow older and among 14-year-olds, the school attendance rate is still 95 percent. In rural areas, school attendance rates for children between 7 and 11 years of age are also above 90 percent.

Compared to urban children, rural children are much more likely to be engaged in child labor. The highest child labor rate in urban areas is observed for children 14 years old (36 percent). In contrast, one third of all 6-year-olds (32 percent) and half of all 7-year-olds (50 percent) do child labor. Child labor rates continue to increase with age and at 14 years, 78 percent of all rural children work, compared to 70 percent in this age group who attend school.

The last graph, in the lower right quadrant, compares children from the richest and poorest 20 percent of all households. The overall pattern is very similar to that for urban and rural children. Children from wealthy households are much more likely to attend school and less likely to work than children from poor households. In the richest household quintile, school attendance rates are between 99 and 100 percent for all children aged 7 to 14 years, while child labor rates do not exceed 32 percent. In the poorest household quintile, the child labor rate reaches 86 percent among 14-year-old children. 66 percent of 14-year-olds from the poorest household are in school.

A comparison of the individual graphs makes clear that the overall pattern of child labor and school attendance in Nepal is strongly influenced by children from poor, rural households. Many of these children work and do not complete their education.

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Friedrich Huebler, 31 July 2006 (edited 5 October 2008), Creative Commons License
Permanent URL: http://huebler.blogspot.com/2006/07/child-labor-and-school-attendance-in.html
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29 June 2006

Child labor and school attendance in Bolivia

Previous posts presented data on primary and secondary school attendance in Bolivia, one of UNICEF's 25 priority countries for girls' education. With a primary school net attendance rate of 76.4 percent, Bolivia is not close to the Millennium Development Goal of a full course of primary schooling for all children by 2015. There are several obstacles on the way to universal primary education and one of these obstacles is child labor.

Child labor can harm a child's health and, even if not harmful, it can interfere with school attendance. The latest data on school attendance for Bolivia comes from a Demographic and Health Survey (DHS) conducted in 2003/04. The DHS did not collect data on work by children but such data is available from a Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey (MICS) that was carried out in 2000.

The graph and table below present the share of children aged 5 to 14 years who attend school or are engaged in child labor. School attendance is defined as attending any level of education at the time of the MICS survey, from preschool over primary to secondary school. Child labor is defined as any economic work during the week of the survey, or more than two hours of domestic work per day. Economic work includes paid or unpaid work for someone who is not a member of the household, and paid or unpaid work for a family farm or business. Domestic work covers activities like cleaning, cooking, shopping, or caring for other children.

School attendance and child labor, children 5-14 years, Bolivia
Bar chart with school attendance and child labor rates in Bolivia, 2000
Data source: Bolivia 2000 MICS.

In total, 89.5 percent of all children between 5 and 14 years are in school and 33.5 percent are engaged in child labor. Older children are more likely to go to school or work than younger children. There is no difference between boys' and girls' school attendance rates but slightly more girls are engaged in child labor. There are clear differences between children from urban and rural areas, especially with regard to child labor. 92.8 percent of all urban children go to school and only 16.6 percent are in child labor. In rural areas, 84.6 percent are in school and more than half of all children, 58.3 percent, are child laborers.

There is also a clear association between household wealth and school or work. Of all groups, children from the poorest 20 percent of all households have the lowest school attendance and highest child labor rates: 82.0 percent are in school and 62.3 percent at work. In contrast, children from the richest 20 percent of all households are most likely to be in school and least likely to work: 96.1 percent of these children attend school and only 14.1 are engaged in child labor. School attendance rates increase steadily with household wealth, while child labor rates decrease.

School attendance and child labor, children 5-14 years, Bolivia 2000

School attendance (%)Child labor (%)
5-9 years86.122.7
10-14 years93.345.7
Male89.432.8
Female89.534.2
Urban92.8
16.6
Rural84.658.3
Poorest household quintile82.062.3
Second household quintile87.535.6
Middle household quintile91.426.1
Fourth household quintile93.917.7
Richest household quintile96.114.1
Total89.533.5
Data source: Bolivia 2000 MICS.

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Friedrich Huebler, 29 June 2006 (edited 5 October 2008), Creative Commons License
Permanent URL: http://huebler.blogspot.com/2006/06/child-labor-and-school-attendance-in.html
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22 June 2006

Update to "Integrating Stata and external text editors"

My guide to integrating Stata and external text editors has been updated. I added a new section with supported editors. So far, six editors are listed: EmEditor, Hidemaru, jEdit, TextPad, Vim, and WinEdt.

If you know of other editors that work with the AutoIt scripts described in the guide, please leave a comment below or send a message to fhuebler@gmail.com so that I can update the list of supported editors.

Friedrich Huebler, 22 June 2006 (edited 29 June 2006), Creative Commons License
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29 May 2006

Blog categories

Starting today, all articles on this blog are organized into categories that are listed in the sidebar. This should make it easier for readers to find articles that interest them. Blogger, the host of my blog, is a powerful and flexible service but one feature is missing: it offers no way to organize posts by category. To find an article on India, for example, readers of this blog had to do a search or browse the archives. [Update December 2006: Blogger has introduced label management. See below for more information.]

Recently I discovered that blog categories can be implemented with the help of del.icio.us, a social bookmarking service. An article on Blogger Tips and Tricks describes an easy method to add categories to a blog. The steps are summarized below, for a detailed description please read the article Creating categories step-by-step.
  • Create a del.icio.us account that will be used only for your blog.
  • Add a del.icio.us bookmarklet or extension to your browser.
  • Log in with the new del.icio.us account name.
  • Bookmark all individual entries from your blog, or at least the most important ones. The tags are the categories that will be listed in the blog sidebar. In contrast to the guide at Blogger Tips and Tricks, I suggest starting with the oldest posts because this ensures that del.icio.us lists the newest posts first, similar to how they appear in your blog. I accomplished this by going to the monthly archives (beginning with the oldest posts), calling up the individual post pages by clicking on the date stamp at the bottom of each article, and tagging each page with del.icio.us.
  • Go to the help section on the del.icio.us site and select the Tag Rolls section under Blog Integration.
  • Customize the appearance of the tag list and copy the code at the bottom of the tag rolls page.
  • Log in to your Blogger account and paste the code to the sidebar section of the template.
  • Save the template and republish the blog.
The result can be seen in the sidebar of my blog, under the heading Categories. I selected a simple list with article count when I customized the tag roll, other options include a tag cloud and varying font size and color depending on the number of articles within each category. Clicking on a keyword, for example India, brings up a del.icio.us page with all articles from my blog that are filed under the respective category, with the most recent articles at the top. The complete list of tags for each article is also shown.

The tag roll code by del.icio.us creates links in colors that vary with the number of articles within each category. I had selected black for all links on the tag roll customization page. This yields a code that contains the part color=000000-000000, where 000000 stands for black (see this RGB color palette). The first number is the color of categories with the smallest number of articles, the second number the color of categories with the highest number of articles. I changed this part to color=114488-114488, which makes all links appear in blue. I have not found a way to underline the links or to change the font of the categories so that they match the rest of my blog.

Update 27 December 2006: Blogger introduced label management to a new beta version of its blogging service in October 2006 (read the announcement on Blogger Buzz). After the new version of Blogger was launched on 19 December 2006 (announcement on Blogger Buzz) I began using the new label feature for my posts. Blogger labels are now listed under each post. Clicking on a label leads to a page containing all posts with the particular label (example: all posts labeled "India"). However, I continue to list the del.icio.us tag roll in the side bar of my blog because it offers certain advantages. The main advantage of the del.icio.us tag roll is that it brings up a comprehensive list of all articles in a certain category, showing only the title and tags (example: all posts tagged "India"). I find this list easier to navigate than a page with complete articles. On the other hand, Blogger labels make it easy to combine all posts on a particular topic on a single page for printing or archiving. To be consistent, I use the same keywords to label articles in Blogger and del.icio.us.

Friedrich Huebler, 29 May 2006 (edited 27 March 2007), Creative Commons License
Permanent URL: http://huebler.blogspot.com/2006/05/blog-categories.html
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27 May 2006

Secondary school attendance in Bolivia

Bolivia is one of UNICEF's 25 priority countries for girls' education. The primary school net attendance rate (NAR) is 76.4 percent, according to results of a Demographic and Health Survey (DHS) from 2003/04. This means that three out of four children of primary school age are in primary school.

Fewer children continue their education at the secondary level. Overall, the secondary school NAR is 56.3 percent according to the DHS, but attendance rates are much higher in urban areas and among the richest households (see the graph below). In the richest 20 percent of all households, 79.9 percent of all children of secondary school age are in secondary school. In urban areas of Bolivia, the secondary school NAR is 67.9 percent. The lowest attendance rate, 27.9 percent, is observed among the poorest 20 percent of all households. In other words, more than seven out of ten children from the poorest households do not attend secondary school. In rural areas the secondary NAR is 37.2 percent.

Secondary school net attendance rate, Bolivia 2003/04
Bar chart with total, male and female secondary school net attendance rate in Bolivia, 2003/04
Data source: Bolivia 2003/04 DHS.

In Bolivia overall, there is gender parity at the secondary level of education. The gender parity index (GPI), the ratio of the female to the male NAR, is 0.98, as shown in the following table. In primary school, gender parity exists regardless of the area of residence and the level of household wealth, but this is not the case at the secondary level of education. In rural areas and among the poorest households, boys are much more likely to attend secondary school than boys. The GPI in rural areas is 0.81 and among the poorest 20 percent of all households it is as low as 0.66, which means that for every three boys only two girls are in secondary school. To reach the Millennium Development Goal of gender parity at all levels of education, it is necessary to bring more girls from poor and rural households into school.

Secondary school net attendance rate, Bolivia 2003/04

Total
NAR (%)		Male NAR (%)Female NAR (%)Difference
male- female		GPI
female/ male
Urban67.967.068.7-1.71.03
Rural37.241.133.18.00.81
Richest 20%79.980.679.31.30.98
Poorest 20%27.933.422.011.40.66
Total56.356.855.91.00.98
GPI: gender parity index. - Data source: Bolivia 2003/04 DHS.

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Friedrich Huebler, 27 May 2006 (edited 30 June 2006), Creative Commons License
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26 April 2006

Global Education Digest 2006

UNESCO has released the 2006 edition of its annual Global Education Digest, with data for 2004 or the latest year available. The focus of this year's edition is tertiary education. The 2006 Global Education Digest can be downloaded in PDF format from the website of the UNESCO Institute for Statistics (UIS). The UIS also provides the statistical tables from the report in Excel format. I will use the data to update my global overview of primary and secondary school enrollment and other statistics on this site.

Friedrich Huebler, 26 April 2006, Creative Commons License
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16 April 2006

Primary school attendance in Bolivia

Bolivia, one of the poorest nations in Latin American, is the only country from that region among UNICEF's 25 priority countries for girls' education. In 2005, the population of Bolivia was estimated at 9.1 million, including 1.4 million children of primary school age (6 to 11 years).

A Demographic and Health Survey (DHS) was carried out in Bolivia in 2003/04. This nationally representative household survey collected data in various areas, including education. According to the survey results, the primary school net attendance rate (NAR) is 76.4 percent. The primary school NAR is the share of children of primary school age that are attending primary school. In Bolivia, one in four children of primary school age are thus not in primary school according to the DHS.

Bolivia is not close to the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) of universal primary education, but the goal of gender parity has been reached. With 75.9 percent, the primary school NAR of girls is almost the same as that of boys, 76.9 percent. The gender parity index (GPI), the ratio of female to male NAR, is 0.99. The NAR values are shown in the graph and table below.

Primary school net attendance rate, Bolivia 2003/04
Bar chart with total, male and female primary school net attendance rate in Bolivia, 2003/04
Data source: Bolivia 2003/04 DHS.

There is no gender disparity in Bolivia but disparities exist at other levels. Children in urban areas have a higher primary school NAR (81.0 percent) than children in rural areas (70.4 percent). Household wealth is strongly associated with school attendance. In the richest 20 percent of all households, 89.2 percent of all children of primary school age attend primary school. In the poorest 20 percent of all households, the primary school NAR is 71.2 percent. Raising attendance rates among the rural population and among the poor remains a challenge in Bolivia.

Primary school net attendance rate, Bolivia 2003/04

Total
NAR (%)		Male NAR (%)Female NAR (%)Difference
male- female		GPI
female/ male
Urban81.081.480.70.70.99
Rural70.470.969.91.00.99
Richest 20%89.289.788.61.00.99
Poorest 20%71.271.870.61.20.98
Total76.476.975.91.00.99
GPI: gender parity index. - Data source: Bolivia 2003/04 DHS.

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Friedrich Huebler, 16 April 2006 (edited 30 June 2006), Creative Commons License
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