Introduction
Gender inequality has been one of the most significant issues throughout the history of European society. Women and girls were mostly at a disadvantage in several fields and areas of life, although men were also subjected to inequality in some regions. The labor market was and, as some people would argue, remains the field that is dominated by men, and unfair gender divisions in the labor market are discussed by many sociologists (Scambor et al., 2014). This problem is closely connected to inequality in the field of education. Only in the 19th-century did women get the right to pursue higher education. However, even when those doors were opened for them, most educational institutions remained male-dominated for several decades, and girls were mostly the ones who experienced the lack of education. Although the problem is persistent, in the last several decade’s international organizations have begun to implement gender-sensitive policies and strategies in education.
Education 2030 Agenda
Education 2030 Agenda, also referred to as the Education 2030 Framework for Action, is one of the most well-known strategies currently implemented to provide high-quality education to all social groups regardless of gender, age, or origin. This framework is a part of the Global Goals program, set up by the UN General Assembly in 2015 (UNESCO, 2019). It is the fourth of 17 Sustainable Development Goals developed to achieve a better future for all. One of the targets of the agenda is Gender equality and inclusion. Gender equality in education, as well as in other fields, is one of the top priorities for UNESCO, and a large amount of effort is made to promote it.
Through this Agenda, SDG 4 is aiming to “ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all”, while SDG 5 is to “achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls” (UNESCO, 2019, para. 3). It is essential to apply an approach that “ensures that girls and boys, women and men not only gain access to education cycles but are empowered equally in and through education” (UNESCO, 2020, para. 2). These goals need to be recognized to achieve gender equality.
According to the UNESCO Institute of statistics, gender gaps have not become the problem of the past yet. It is estimated that 16 million girls worldwide will remain out of school, and about 500 of the 750 million women are reported to not have basic literacy skills (UNESCO, 2020, para. 4). Therefore, despite the progress made in recent decades, gender gaps still exist, and girls are still at a disadvantage in terms of education. The main causes of this problem include poverty, disabilities, and poor living conditions in some geographically isolated areas. However, the biggest obstacles seem to be gender-based discrimination, and the traditional status of women, typical in some regions.
European Commission’s Strategy 2020-2025
Another example of a gender equality program being implemented internationally is the European Commission’s strategy 2020-2025. The strategy is in large part connected to the European Institute for Gender Equality (EIGE). This agency aims at promoting equality between women and men in all EU Member States, as well as in other countries all around the world (European Commission, 2020). The main tasks of the institute are collecting, analyzing, and publishing data on the issues of gender equality.
The institute’s main tool to measure equality is the Gender Equality Index, used in a variety of areas, such as work and education. The data published in 2019 showed that despite the progress in the recent decades, inequality between men and women remains a topic problem in several countries (European Institute for Gender Equality, 2019). As revealed in the 2019 edition, the EU’s score for gender equality has only risen by about 5.5 points since 15 years ago, and since 2015, it is up 1.2 points. The index also estimated the areas in which the EU has succeeded most. It appears that the EU is closest to gender equality in the fields of health, housing, and money, while power turned out to be the most worrying domain in this context.
The main goal of the strategy is to provide the issue of gender inequality with a new impetus and set out a political program, consisting of key actions to be taken. This program outlines the steps and measures that should be implemented within the following 5 years to improve the situation. Including “a gender perspective in all EU policies and processes”, the organization ensures that all its activities correspond to the needs “of all women and men, girls and boys, in all their diversity” (European Commission, 2020, para. 12). Thus, gender mainstreaming is another practice the EU plans to implement.
Gender-Responsive Education Sector Planning (GRESP)
Among the measures used by international organizations to advance gender equality in education is the strategy called Gender-Responsive Education Sector Planning, or GRESP. It is a part of the UN Girls’ Education Initiative, which was launched by the UN in 2000 (UNGEI, 2017). The initiative has collaborated with “the Global Partnership for Education, UNICEF, UNESCO IIEP, Plan International, FAWE, and the African Union” (UNGEI, 2017, para. 4). These partnerships enabled the program to be introduced in a wide range of regions.
As a major part of the initiative, numerous workshops are being convened in African and South Asian countries, such as Cameroon, Guinea, Kenya, Liberia, Mozambique, Nigeria, Uganda, Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, Pakistan, and many others (UNGEI, 2017, para. 7). The partners of the initiative are also constantly supported to analyze the education sector within the context of a specific country to identify gender disparities and factors that cause them. They then are encouraged to use this analysis to design and implement action plans that would broadly address the problem of gender inequality in those regions.
Apart from the workshops, this strategy uses the GRESP Guidance Tool as a resource to help different countries eliminate gender bias and inequality that arises as a result of it. The Guidance for Developing GRESP is supposed to improve and complete the programs that already exist (UNGEI, 2019, p. 6). It has 10 modules, which are based on the stages of the planning cycle, and consist of information, as well as practical exercises on how to collect, analyze and interpret data in a gender-sensitive manner.
Conclusion
Taking into consideration the strategies that have been discussed above, it can be concluded that global organizations make substantial efforts to solve the problem of gender inequality, which remains relevant despite the improvements made. Among the major programs, introduced in education, are the Education 2030 Framework for Action, the European Commission’s strategy 2020-2025, and Gender-Responsive Education Sector Planning. Development institutions and agencies from different countries work in partnership with international organizations that launched these programs, and the main objective of this work is to promote accessible education for all people around the world.
References
European Commission. (2020). Questions and answers: Gender equality strategy 2020-2025.
European Institute for Gender Equality. (2019). Gender equality index 2019: Still far from the finish line.
Scambor, E., Bergmann, N., Wojnicka, K., Belghiti-Mahut, S., Hearn, J., Holter, Ø. G., Gärtner, M., Hrženjak, M., Scambor, C., & White, A. (2014). Men and gender equality. Men and Masculinities, 17(5), 552-577. Web.
United Nations Girls’ Education Initiative. (2017). Gender-responsive education systems. Web.
United Nations Girls’ Education Initiative. (2019). Gender-responsive education sector planning: A pathway to gender equality in education. Web.
UNESCO. (2019). Leading SDG 4 – education 2030.
UNESCO. (2020). Education and gender equality.