Education In Third World Countries


In most developing nations, majority of children do not complete primary school and only a few of them progress from secondary schools. Taking Ghana for instance, it is observed that, grade 5 is only completed by a half of the total children in the country with majority of those who complete not being in a position to either write or comprehend simple paragraph. Education for All program by UNESCO which is parts of the Millennium Goals have been striving to ensure that there is universal and free basic education for everyone in the developing countries leading to an increase in enrolment in schools. Nonetheless, drawing from periodic reports on Education for All, it emerges that, most children are dropping out of school despite these efforts by UNESCO to contain them. One question that remain a misery for many is why do these children drop out of school despite these efforts?

Various reasons have been highlighted on the causes of drop out in school by children in developing nations. Firstly, the cost of education. As argued by this author, despite having tuition waiver for education in the developing nations, there often exist some expenses in the form of uniforms, lunch, uniform and fare. Moreover, since there is often poor quality in thee nations, parents are in many cases forced to pay extra fees for tuition to compliment with the normal tuition so that their students can pass. Another reason for the drop out of children from school in developing nations is due to a belief of poor job prospect. Because of such beliefs, children find no essence of proceeding with schooling after passing grade 5 because doing so does not significantly improve them.

Lastly, in developing nations, education does not offer the children with any financial literacy require for managing the meagre resources they have under their own direct control and does not provide them with any opportunity required to build health or secure a livelihood. As further stressed by this author, education only offers a meagre assistance needed for promoting physical health required for quality of life and stability.

In conclusion therefore, a robust model of education that combine critically significant health, financial and administrative skills with the ancient contents which can be passed through existing teachers and school systems need to be developed. This will enable the developing nations to shift the educational goals towards realising a positive impact on the social and economic well-being of both the communities and the students.