Paris/Santiago. The Covid-19 pandemic deepens education inequality in Latin America and the Caribbean. That goes from a current one Message the United Nations Education, Science, Culture and Communication Organization (Unesco). This situation requires urgent action to help those most in need.
The authors of the study, which was released on Thursday, call for the disadvantaged not to be forgotten in the context of the current health crisis – in a region that was the most unequal in the world in terms of education in terms of education even before the pandemic broke out.
The efforts of the countries to continue the teaching process “at a distance” deserved recognition, but many students had been left behind and needed help. Measures would have to be taken to avoid a “generational catastrophe” as a result of the educational emergency created by Covid-19.
According to the Unesco report entitled “2020 Latin America and the Caribbean – Inclusion and Education: Everyone Without Exception,” prior to the pandemic, students in 21 countries from higher-income households were five times more likely than they were to complete upper secondary education Students from poor households. There are difficulties in achieving a minimum of reading skills, basic math skills and attendance in class. Half of the 15-year-olds in the region can hardly read.
For Summa director Javier González, the region’s educational systems are “not only characterized by their low quality, but also by their high level of inequality and social exclusion”. These problems would have worsened during the health crisis, particularly among the most disadvantaged groups such as indigenous people, people of African descent and people with disabilities. There is an urgent need for investment and reform of education systems so that they can adapt to the special needs of learners and territories.
Participants in the study were the World Education Monitoring Report, the Unesco Regional Office for Education in Santiago and the Laboratory for Research and Innovation in Education for Latin America and the Caribbean (Summa). It contains ten recommendations for the coming decade and calls on the countries to take them into account in their action plans in order to achieve the goals of the 2030 Agenda and to prevent the progress made in the education sector from being undone by Covid-19. Education inequalities should be reduced. Schools are encouraged to be more inclusive.
Unesco announced that the study will be discussed at the Regional Forum for Education Policy 2020 under the motto “Inclusion and Education in Post-Pandemic Times”, which will take place from November 9th to 13th with the participation of ministerial officials and experts. Panel discussions and workshops will be held during the forum to present the main findings of each chapter of the report.
– .
