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UNGEI - News and Events - Invest in the Future: Empower Girls Now - 0 views

  • First, investing in adolescent girls benefits everyone. When they flourish, their families and communities flourish as well. The benefits will go a long way in a girl’s lifetime, and for generations to come.
  • As One UN, we will support national development efforts to invest in adolescent girls’ rights, health, education, protection, livelihoods. We can no longer afford to exclude the millions of adolescent girls left behind. They are central to the MDGs and we must make them visible in national action plans and budgets. We must improve our data systems to track the change we aspire to see in their lives.
  • This is because investing in adolescent girls is both the best and smartest investment a country can make. Educated, healthy and skilled, she will be an active citizen in her community. She will become a mother when she is ready and invest in her future children’s health and education. She will be able to contribute fully to her society and break the cycle of poverty, one girl at a time.
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  • Multiply this by 500 million girls in the developing world and imagine the possibilities. These girls are part of the largest youth population in history, and when they enter the workforce educated, skilled, and healthy, they can help put countries on a path to greater prosperity, peace, and progress, provided the right policies are in place.
  • We must act now before it is too late. Adolescence is a tumultuous time, especially for the youngest, poorest, most marginalized girls. Without the right opportunities, these girls experience too much too soon. They leave school too early; they are married off and become pregnant before they are ready, and have children while children themselves, often at significant risks to their lives. In shocking numbers, they experience violence and harmful practices, are infected by HIV at alarming rates, and join the labor force often under unsafe conditions.
  • The UN Adolescent Girls Task Force aims to change this. A year ago during the Commission of the Status of Women, six UN agencies committed to five key actions: (1) educate girls; (2) improve adolescent girls’ health, including their sexual and reproductive health; (3) keep adolescent girls free from violence; (4) promote adolescent girl leaders and (5) count adolescent girls, so they are no longer invisible and we can measurably see the difference to be made in their lives.
Teachers Without Borders

U.N. Task Force Pushes for Investment in Teen Girls - IPS ipsnews.net - 0 views

  • Risk of sexual violence, limited access to education, and health issues such as HIV/AIDS and forced female genital mutilation/cutting are just a few of the obstacles adolescent girls face in developing countries, yet these girls are the key to the future and the eradication of poverty, stress experts at the U.N. Commission on the Status of Women (CSW).
  • Children "face grave vulnerabilities and grave challenges as they make the transition towards adulthood," he added. The U.N. Adolescent Girls Task Force, which organised a panel on the issue Friday, is comprised of the U.N. Population Fund (UNFPA), the children's agency UNICEF, the newly-launched U.N. Women, and several other U.N. entities.
  • In countries where the majority of the population is extremely young, such as Malawi, investing and empowering adolescents through education is critical to the country's development. The median age in Malawi 17 years old, and 73.6 percent of the population is below the age of 29, noted Janet Zeenat Karim, head of the Malawi delegation to the U.N.
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  • It aims to facilitate the empowerment of adolescent girls by working with governments and civil society on policies to that effect. In a joint statement, the UNAGTF organisations listed educating adolescent girls, improving their health, protecting them from violence, promoting their leadership, and collect statistic data on them as five priorities in their efforts to advance the rights of adolescent girls.
  • Karim praised the work of U.N. agencies in Malawi, where adolescent girls face many challenges, including early marriage and early childbearing, which pose serious health risks. Additionally, females account for more than half of all HIV infections in Malawi. The level of sexual and reproductive health of girls in Malawi is among the worst in the world.
  • "The UNFPA has mobilised and worked with the National Youth Council [of Malawi] to advocate against a bill on child marriage that was going to go to parliament that would have made the legal age of a marriage 16," she said.
  • Wong also stressed the importance of respecting local culture while introducing new ideas and relevant practices. In Ethiopia, for example, UNFPA has found that working with the community is enormously beneficial, particularly in bringing about long-term change that seriously improves the lives and futures of adolescent girls.
Teachers Without Borders

Welcome - Millennia 2015- ©® Institut Destrée / The Destree Institute - 0 views

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    Start with a Girl: A New Agenda for Global Health Center for Global Development   "The health of adolescent girls is everyone's business. We all need to step up to the plate to embrace this ambitious agenda."-Melinda Gates   Improving the health of adolescent girls in the developing world is the key to improving maternal and child health, reducing the impact of HIV, and accelerating social and economic development.   Start with a Girl: A New Agenda for Global Health describes the most prevalent and serious health problems adolescent girls face in developing countries, linking them to a combination of specific public-health risks and social determinants of health. It highlights the diverse ways in which governments and non-governmental organizations have sought to break vicious cycles of ill health. Finally, and most importantly, the report lays out an ambitious yet feasible agenda for governments, donors, the private sector, and civil society organizations-complete with estimates of indicative costs.
Teachers Without Borders

Effective policies give children in Angola a second chance to learn  | Back o... - 0 views

  • Despite recent economic development, Angola remains a society deeply scarred by the still-recent civil war. The conflict caused massive internal displacement and refugee outflows, along with the collapse or destruction of key agricultural, health, education and transportation infrastructures, limiting the government’s ability to provide basic public services. This has resulted in a series of barriers to children enrolling and remaining in school.
  • Children living in emergencies or post-conflict contexts are often excluded from schooling or start school late. Their educational progress suffers and they lack the necessary tools for learning, leading them to drop out of school.
  • Many of today’s adolescents in Angola were born during the prolonged civil war and missed several years of schooling or never had the opportunity to attend primary school at all. These youth often do not fit in the primary school setting, and classrooms are already crowded with much younger children.
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  • UNICEF’s Accelerated Learning Programme, called Programa de Alfabetização e Aceleração Escolar (PAAE) in Angola, provides a second-chance learning opportunity for literacy, numeracy and life skills for adolescents through a condensed and adapted primary school curriculum, which can be completed in two-and-a-half years rather than the full six years of primary schooling. It thus encourages out-of-school adolescents to complete primary education, come back into the school system and continue to the second level.
  • “The Accelerated Learning Programme is a critical national strategy of the Government of Angola but what is more important is that this strategy is translated into a second chance and a renewal of hope for adolescents, and girls especially, to continue to learn and develop,” said Paulina Feijo, UNICEF Angola, Education Project Officer.
Teachers Without Borders

Connecting Teachers With Neuroscience Research - Inside School Research - Education Week - 1 views

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    Researchers in the University of Toronto's neuroscience department are planning to launch a website that will make information about neuroscience and its implications for instruction available to educators this fall. The website is part of a project called "The Adolescent Brain: Implications for Instruction," which will also include a quarterly newsletter and professional development courses. Hazel McBride and Michael Ferrari, both researchers with the University's well-known Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, say they're responding to teachers' interest in using research in neuroscience to inform classroom practices.
Teachers Without Borders

Gaps between boys and girls in developing world widen as they get older - UN report - 0 views

  • 13 September 2011 – A new report by the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) highlights significant gaps in areas such as education and health, mostly favouring males, as boys and girls in developing countries grow older. “While there is little difference between boys and girls in early childhood with respect to nutrition, health, education and other basic indicators, differences by gender appear increasingly more pronounced during adolescence and young adulthood,” said Geeta Rao Gupta, UNICEF Deputy Executive Director.
  • The data shows that girls are significantly more likely to be married as children (under 18 years of age) and to begin having sex at a young age. Young women are less likely to be literate than young men and are less likely to watch television, listen to the radio and read a newspaper or magazine. In addition, young men are better informed about HIV/AIDS and are also more likely to protect themselves with condoms during sex. Young women in sub-Saharan Africa, the report says, are two to four times more likely to be infected with HIV/AIDS than young men.
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    "While there is little difference between boys and girls in early childhood with respect to nutrition, health, education and other basic indicators, differences by gender appear increasingly more pronounced during adolescence and young adulthood," said Geeta Rao Gupta, UNICEF Deputy Executive Director.
Teachers Without Borders

High schools join the fight against depression - 0 views

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    Distinguishing between mood disorders and the normal difficulties of adolescence is not always easy, but a new program has been developed by the institute to give teachers and students a better understanding of mental health issues. Advertisement: Story continues below The HeadStrong program uses classroom activities to share information and prompt discussions on depression and bipolar disorders, at-risk personality types, coping strategies and where to get support. The institute will train 1500 high school teachers across Australia in the HeadStrong teaching resource over the next three years. It will reach 90,000 students, with a focus on those in rural and remote locations.
Teachers Without Borders

Annotated Bibliography: Education for Youth Affected by Crisis | INEE Site - 1 views

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    Crises negatively affect the education and livelihood prospects of youth, which in turn can play a role in the perpetuation of fragility in post-crisis settings. The development and implementation of effective education and training for youth in contexts characterized by displacement, a breakdown of social services, and economic despair presents a broad spectrum of challenges. Yet, it is a necessary component of promoting self-sufficiency and long-term stability. This annotated bibliography aims to contribute to building the evidence base to effectively articulate and advocate for successful, quality education programming for all youth affected by crisis. The selection criteria for documents reviewed in this annotated bibliography were broadly defined as any texts dealing with, reviewing, analyzing, evaluating or describing educational programmes catering specifically or partially to youth and adolescents in situations of emergency, protracted crisis through to post-crisis and recovery. Preference was given to texts that address specific impacts and lessons learned. This review is not meant to be a mapping exercise of existing programmes and actors, rather it attempts to document specific impacts of programmatic approaches. To suggest additional articles to be included in the annotated bibliography or for further information, please contact youthtaskteam@ineesite.org or minimumstandards@ineesite.org.
Gwen Stamm

Investing in Women and Girls | Women for Women International - 0 views

  • Investing in Women and Girls Development experts agree that investing in women and girls is critical to achieving broader development goals.
  • It’s true. After one year of intensive training in rights awareness, health and life skills, vocational training, and social networking, we have seen extraordinary results in the least likely of places. At least 80% of young women in Afghanistan, Nigeria, Kosovo, and Rwanda reported higher confidence and more awareness of their rights, which are critical resources to future political and economic participation in their families and communities. Afghanistan, DRC, Nigeria and Rwanda all had over 75% of young women report a better economic situation. 89% of our young participants in Afghanistan reported their general and family health to be better after graduation, and 87% of young women in Rwanda reported health improvements.
    • Gwen Stamm
       
      solution for gender inequality or empowerment of women
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    This website has many articles that focus on women and girls rights - see article "Young Women and Adolescent Girls"
Teachers Without Borders

Student Drop Out Rate on the Increase Despite Free Education - IPS ipsnews.net - 1 views

  • The free primary education, which is also compulsory, saw many children, particularly from poor families; enjoy an opportunity to be in school. Based on reports by the Ministry of Education, the number of boys and girls enrolled in primary school has risen from five million to a staggering eight million.
  • According to the latest Kenya Demographic Health Survey (KDHS), 40 percent of adolescent girls without any education are either pregnant or have already become mothers. In addition, for those girls with only a primary school education, 26 percent are mothers compared to an eight percent of those who have a secondary school education or higher.
  • "This shows that the impact of secondary and even college education can delay child- bearing and therefore give girls an opportunity to pursue their dreams," expounds Nelly Mwangi, a teacher in Nairobi.
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  • According to the findings of a national survey of secondary school students, over 13 percent of students will have experienced their first pregnancy by the time they celebrate their fourteenth birthday.
  • "Although there is sexual education incorporated into the curriculum, it is too basic and may not be an effective intervention, based on all the explicit messages that children are exposed to from such an early age," explains Paul Kipkorir, a teacher in Nairobi.
  • To fill the gap, various stakeholders have begun supporting the ‘Return to School’ programme, which has faced numerous challenges. " Pupils taunt and mock those who come to school after giving birth. Schools therefore need to be more sensitive to teenage mothers if they are to continue with their education," explains Paul Kipkorir.
  • Further, there have been various efforts towards more preventive measures. The Ministry of Education is now working closely with organisations that have vast experience in the field of adolescents’ reproductive health and are able to provide more comprehensive information on sexuality in schools.
Teachers Without Borders

Education failures fan the flames in the Arab world « World Education Blog - 1 views

  • Education is a key ingredient of the political crisis facing Arab states. Superficially, the education profile of the region is starting to resemble that of East Asia. The past two decades have witnessed dramatic advances in primary and secondary school enrollment, with a step-increase in tertiary education. Many governments have increased public spending on education. The 7% of GDP that Tunisia invests in the sector puts the country near the top of the global league table for financial effort.
  • In Egypt, the education group most likely to be unemployed is university level and above, followed by post-secondary. Around one quarter of the country’s male university graduates are unemployed, and almost half of its female graduates.
  • For all the expansion of access and investment in education, the Arab states have some of the world’s worst performing education systems. The problems start early. In this year’s Global Monitoring Report we carry a table showing the distribution of performance across different countries in reading test scores at grade 4. In Kuwait, Qatar and Morocco, over 90% of students scored below the lowest benchmark, indicating that they lacked even basic comprehension.  In fact, these countries held the bottom three positions in a group of 37 countries covered.
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  • The median (or middle-performing) student in Algeria, Egypt and Syria scores below the low-benchmark; in Tunisia they score just above. In other words, half of the students in each country have gone through eight years of school to arrive at a level that leaves them with no working knowledge of basic math. In Saudi Arabia and Qatar, over 80% of students fall below the low benchmark. The median student in both performs at around the same level as their counterpart in Ghana and El Salvador – and Qatar is the worst performing country covered in the survey.
  • Why are education systems in the Middle East and North Africa performing so badly? In many countries, teachers are poorly trained – and teaching is regarded as a low-status, last-resort source of employment for entrants to the civil service. There is an emphasis on rote learning, rather than solving problems and developing more flexible skills. And education systems are geared towards a public sector job market that is shrinking, and for entry to post-secondary education. Most don’t make it. And those who do emerge with skills that are largely irrelevant to the needs of employers.
  • Moreover, many Arab youth view their education systems not as a source of learning and opportunity, but as a vehicle through which autocratic rulers seek to limit critical thinking, undermine freedom of speech and reinforce their political control.
  • To a large extent, the protest movement across the Arab States has been led by educated youth and adults frustrated by political autocracy and limited economic opportunity. This has deflected attention from an education crisis facing low-income households in primary education – and from the needs of adolescents and youth emerging from school systems with just a few years of sub-standard education.
  • The Arab states have an unfinished agenda on basic education.  They still have 6 million primary school age children out of school – around 16% of the world’s total. Despite the vast gap in wealth between the two countries, Saudi Arabia has a lower primary school enrolment rate than Zambia. The Arab world also has some very large gender disparities: in Yemen, primary school enrolment rates are 79% for boys, but just 66% for girls.
  • Consider the case of Egypt. On average, someone aged 17-22 years old in the country has had around nine years of education. That’s roughly what might be anticipated on the basis of the country’s income. Scratch the surface, though, and you get a different picture: around 12% of Egyptians have had less than two years of education.
  • High dropout rates from primary and lower secondary school are symptomatic of parental poverty, poor quality education, and a sustained failure on the part of the Egyptian government to tackle the underlying causes of inequality. Adolescents from poor backgrounds entering labor markets without a secondary education are carrying a one-way ticket to a life of poverty, insecurity and marginalization.
  • The political crisis sweeping Arab states is the product of many years of political failure. The aspirations and hopes of young people – who are increasingly connected to each other and the outside world through the Internet – are colliding with an atrophied political system governed by complacent, self-interested elites who are disconnected from the population.
Teachers Without Borders

Netherlands provides US$10 million for UNICEF Education Programme in Zambia |... - 0 views

  • LUSAKA, Zambia, 16 January 2012 (UNICEF) – The Government of the Netherlands is supporting the UNICEF education programme in Zambia with US$10 million (50 trillion Zambian kwacha) with a focus on the most vulnerable children in the country. “The overall goal of the programme is to contribute to the national targets of improving children’s access to equitable quality education, in line with the Millennium Development Goals and the Sixth National Development Plan. If we are to expect Zambia’s children and adolescents to be able to develop, learn, and participate in a protective and enabling environment, it is our duty and responsibility as a partner country to double our efforts in providing the required support to help us reap these desired results,,” said His Excellency Ambassador Harry Molenaar of the Royal Netherlands Embassy during a signing ceremony in Lusaka.
Teachers Without Borders

IRIN Africa | DRC: Millions miss out on basic education | DRC | Children | Education - 0 views

  • KINSHASA, 14 November 2011 (IRIN) - Access to basic education in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) remains poor, with up to seven million children across the vast country out of school - despite a 2010 government decision to make primary education free.
  • It said 25 percent of the primary school-aged children and 60 percent of adolescents were not enrolled in classes.
  • "Even with the announcement of free primary education, parents, many of whom are unemployed and have little means of sustaining themselves, are bearing most of the costs involved in educating their children because of delays in releasing the funds for free education," Ornelie Lelo, communications officer for an education NGO in the capital, SOS Kinshasa, told IRIN.
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  • "Many of the public schools in existence are in deplorable conditions; no blackboards in many of them; in some, children sit on the floor due to lack of desks, and the most worrying concern is encroachment on school land by individuals, many of whom are connected politically," Lelo said. "One can find a pharmacy, restaurant or even bar right in the middle of a school compound - it looks like all open spaces in schools are up for grabs.
  • Education officials have expressed concern over the severe shortage of teachers in public schools. In primary school, the national average is one teacher for 37 pupils, according to the national statistics, but in marginalized or rural areas, there can be more than 100 pupils per class.
  • Tshimbalanga said the average monthly salary for a primary school teacher was $35-40 and since the teachers' salaries are often several months in arrears, parents were forced to chip in. "Generally, teachers, like other Congolese workers, survive on very little, some even less than $1 a day, yet the cost of education is borne by parents, sometimes even up to 65 percent of the total cost," Tshimbalanga said. "In rural areas, some teachers supplement their earnings by working as casual labourers on farms; those in urban areas end up begging for money from their pupils' parents just to survive." To improve the quality of education, Tshimbalanga said, the government had to pay teachers properly. He said the teachers’ union entered into an agreement in 2004 with the government for teachers to be paid a minimum of $208 monthly but six years later, this has not been implemented.
Teachers Without Borders

The bullying gender gap: Girls more likely to be targets - The Globe and Mail - 0 views

  • New research suggests that females such as Ms. Lee may be particularly vulnerable to bullying from other females, even as rates of male bullying decline. It’s a troubling finding that highlights where parents, educators and policy makers may need to focus their efforts to counter the effects of school-related bullying.
  • A comprehensive report released last month by researchers from the Toronto-based Centre for Addiction and Mental Health found that while overall rates of bullying have remained relatively stable in recent years, some significant gender disparities have emerged.
  • The study found that nearly one-third, or 29 per cent, of students reported being bullied since the start of the school year.
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  • The report, called the Ontario Student Drug Use and Health Survey, has been conducted every two years since 1977, making it the longest continuing survey of young people in Canada and one of the longest in the world. Nearly 9,300 students in Grades 7 to 12 from 181 different Ontario schools participated in the most recent survey, which was conducted from October, 2010, to June, 2011.
  • Online or cyber-bullying was also much more common among females, with 28 per cent of girls reporting being targeted by cyber-bullying compared to just 15 per cent of boys.
  • The overall rates haven’t really changed since 2003, the first year CAMH monitored bullying at school. But the survey found that females are more likely to be bullied. Thirty-one per cent of adolescent girls reported being victimized in the most recent survey, compared to 26 per cent for boys.
  • This raises several questions: Do boys get along better than girls? Have programs aimed at curbing bullying failed to reach girls?
  • “The problem is girls do it all underneath the surface,” said Haley Higdon, a facilitator with the SNAP for Schools program.The SNAP (Stop Now and Plan) model is designed to help reach children with behavioural problems or other issues. As a facilitator, Ms. Higdon works in classrooms in the Toronto District School Board. Often, the behavioural problems she encounters stem from bullying.
  • With boys, bullying is typically much easier to detect because male bullies often resort to physical measures, such as fighting. With girls, the behaviour can be much more subtle, making it more difficult for teachers to detect.
  • Bullying can take on many forms. It’s not just one child pushing another in the schoolyard – it is any aggressive or unwanted behaviour that involves a real or perceived imbalance in power, according to StopBullying.gov, a U.S. government website.
Teachers Without Borders

IRIN Global | Girls fare worse in disasters | Global | Aid Policy | Conflict | Disaster... - 0 views

  • During disasters, girls fare worse than the rest of the population, according to a new report released on 11 October by child rights NGO Plan International. “Men, women, boys and girls experience disasters in different ways. Pre-existing inequalities and vulnerabilities will be exacerbated in disasters and will affect girls and women more,” said Plan International regional director Gezahegn Kebede at an event for the launch of the report.
  • “In emergencies, given their gender, age, and humanitarian status [girls] experience triple disadvantage,” said Kebede. However, education can be a powerful mitigating tool, and can significantly improve their livelihoods.
  • The report entitled The State of the World’s Girls 2013: In Double Jeopardy: Adolescent Girls and Disasters argues that a combination of political, economic, social and cultural attitudes can lead to discrimination of girls during disasters.
Teachers Without Borders

UNICEF - At a glance: Haiti - Jean's story: An adolescent girl's belief in education pr... - 2 views

  • “The change that I expected, I don’t see it yet,” Jean said of Haiti’s rebuilding process. “But what is good in my life is that I always wanted to graduate from high school, and now I’m in my last year, and I’m about to achieve that dream.”
Teachers Without Borders

Child Earthquake Survivors Relive Trauma as Radiation Fears Add to Stress - Bloomberg - 0 views

  • As the tsunami hit her school in Sendai, kindergarten teacher Junko Kamada stood in the window of a second story hall to block the children from seeing the destruction caused by the 1.5-meter wave. Amid dirt-caked chairs, soiled books and damaged equipment, Kamada, 60, is preparing to bring the students back to the school, about a mile inland from the coast. The children will also need counseling to deal with the trauma they have experienced, psychologists say.
  • Schools resumed two days ago in northeastern Japan, the epicenter of the March 11 magnitude-9 earthquake. Classes --some held in homes and makeshift spaces -- are providing a safe place for children to reunite with friends and a semblance of familiarity amid the nation’s worst disaster since World War II.
  • While adolescents attuned to the reality of death may act out their trauma, younger ones find it harder to articulate their distress, she said. People who suffer psychological ailments such as depression in childhood are 10 to 20 times more likely than others to experience those problems in adulthood, according to a 2010 study in the journal Social Science & Medicine. Affected individuals tend to leave school earlier and earn about 20 percent less over their lifetime, the authors found.
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  • “When children suffer from an acute fear, they tend to depend on their mothers more for their safety, and display regressive and immature behavior,” said Naotaka Shinfuku, professor of psychiatry at Seinan Gakuin University in Fukuoka, who studied the impact of the 1995 earthquake in the Japanese city of Kobe. “It’s good for children’s mental health to learn and play in a safe environment if they wish to do so.”
  • “Kids saw their friends for the first time in days,” Saijo, 53, said. “They were very happy, hugging each other -- something we hadn’t seen in a while.”
  • At the Sakuragi Hanazono kindergarten, where Junko Kamada began her teaching career almost 40 years ago, that means not succumbing to grief. “The teachers are incredibly sad,” Kamada said. “They know children they have cared for have died, but they are trying to get the school back on its feet.”
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    "The teachers are incredibly sad," Kamada said. "They know children they have cared for have died, but they are trying to get the school back on its feet."
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