Challenging gender, poverty, and inequalities in schooling through collaborative, cross-national partnerships: Evidence from CARE Bangladesh and CARE Malawi
| Authors | Type | Stream | Full Paper |
|---|---|---|---|
| Grace Chisamya, Joan deJaeghere, Nancy Kendall, Marufa Aziz Khan | Open call | Poverty |  en |
Aim of Research
The Patsy Collins Trust Fund Initiative (PCTFI) is an eight-country, cross-national research action project that uses educational innovations to improve the lives of marginalized girls and boys. The purpose of the research component of PCTFI is to assess the longitudinal impact of the educational innovations, implemented as a quasi-experimental design in these two countries. PCTFI is grounded in a framework, which attends to gendered issues of attainment, equality, empowerment, and quality. This paper presents findings from situation analysis and program and research data in two countries, Bangladesh and Malawi. The situation analyses aimed at identifying and understanding how gender inequities and other forms of discrimination in community and national contexts affect boys and girls, and in particular marginalize them in their primary schooling experiences. These data were in turn used to shape educational innovations to improve the lives of marginalized girls and boys.
The Bangladesh and Malawi country offices (COs) each identified rural communities in districts that face extreme poverty, flooding (in Bangladesh), food shortages, and lack of educational and other human services. The communities are ones in which CARE has worked, but not concertedly in educational issues. Each CO conducted a situation analysis; shared information with key actors to gather feedback about the proposed program; and is now in the process of undertaking longitudinal and quasi-experimental research to judge the effects of the programs. COs have shared information with each other, and have utilized data collection instruments and approaches to ensure a set of comparative data across countries.
Participants and Methodology
PCTFI’s research methodology is guided by a cross-country framework that emphasizes the following key constructs: attainment, gender equality, empowerment, and quality, which aim to measure and understand the multiple intersecting conditions that affect girls and boys in their communities and schools. PCTFI positions school-age girls and boys as central participants and voices in understanding issues of education and gender inequalities in these communities. In addition, the situation analyses aimed to understand the perspective of multiple community members, using multiple qualitative and quantitative data collection techniques.
While each country developed their own items and questions in various protocols, there were some common data collection methods and items, and the common framework guided the type of data sought. In both countries, data were collected from a wide range of stakeholders to examine the framework’s four constructs. For example, data were collected from girls and boys on their agency, rights, workload, and self-esteem; and their perceptions of school quality and girls’ educational capacities. Parents were asked about their gender attitudes, perceptions of educational quality, and girls’ and boys’ educational capacity, and perceptions of community responsibilities and rights vis a vis the school.
Table 1: Situation Analysis participants and data collection activities
| Setting/Group | Bangladesh (7 communities) | Malawi |
| Primary age in-school girls/boys | Questionnaires, 53 Grade 3-5 girls and boys
FGD with 8 girls/boys groups |
Questionnaires, 240 Standard 4-6 girls and boys.
FGDs, 80 girls and boys |
| Primary age out-of-school girls/boy | Questionnaires, 25 out-of-school
FGD with 8 girls/boys OOS groups |
Life histories and interviews, 6 drop-outs/teen mothers |
| Community members and Parents (M/F) | Community Power Analysis
In-depth Questionnaires, 44 mothers and fathers; |
Household questionnaire, 240 household members/ parents |
| Teachers and Head Teachers | Interviews, 9 teachers Grades 3 – 5 | Interviews, 4 Head Teachers. Classroom observations and FGDs with 32 teachers in Grades 4-6 |
| Data collected from schools | Student attendance, completion and achievement data | Student attendance, drop-out and achievement student data |
| School Management Committees, community leaders | FGD and participatory data, 11 community groups | Interviews, FGDs, and participatory data collection, 32 SMC members and community leaders |
| Gender and education officials (district and national) | Key informant interviews, 4 district officials; 30 gender and education experts |
Limitations
The situation analyses encountered challenges in the availability of data from school, district and national levels, which were often unreliable or not readily available. This has led to useful conversations across countries about how to collect better data on, for example, enrollment and retention. Another limitation in developing data collection tools is the challenge of understanding the varied meanings constructs such as empowerment and quality in different local contexts. Finally, CARE PCTFI’s effort to expand the indicators used to understand gender equality meant that many data collection tools were developed to address the four main constructs. This resulted in too much, and at times unreliable, data. Data collection methods are now being refined to both suit the local context and desired program outcomes, and to also be comparable across countries.
Research Findings
The analyses from all countries found that attitudes toward girls and their lower social status was a key factor affecting their education. In addition, many countries found that teachers’ attitudes and pedagogical practices were not gender sensitive, and in some case, not child-friendly either. In Malawi, data from students, teachers, community members, and district education officials in Kasungu district revealed deeply-held biases against girls’ intelligence and educational capacity, despite the fact that girls were enrolling in primary school and performing at equal rates to boys. Within classrooms and schools in Kasungu, girls face persistent inequities and, at times, an actively disempowering environment where the message to girls is that they are second-class students, people, and citizens. The baseline data also revealed that ongoing and large-scale government and international efforts to improve educational quality through child-centered learning are ignoring the gender aspects. Malawi is regularly cited as one of the world’s success stories in improving girls’ education. The CARE team capitalized on this history by collecting and analyzing best practices, curricular materials, and lessons learned from previous teacher training and girls’ education projects. These data, coupled with the situation analysis, led to the development of an innovative program incorporating gender-sensitive child-centered pedagogy (GSCCP), teacher training in GSCCP, and mobilization around a school culture supportive of egalitarian gender relations between and among school leaders, teachers, students, and school committee members. The program will be implemented in 26 schools. The long-term impact of the program will be measured by its effects on teacher classroom practices; changes in stakeholders’ perceptions of girls’ educational capacity; and improvements in girls’ and boys’ attendance and achievement in grades 4 through 6.
In Bangladesh, the situation analysis revealed that a few people in the community wield power that negatively influences community attitudes, teachers’ practices in the school, and decisions about whether girls and boys participate in school. In addition, the School Management Committees (SMCs) do not function well to provide monitoring of school resources and quality, students’ attendance and achievement, and accountability of the school to families. Parents and students, particularly girls, found the school environment unsafe. Girls had considerable household work, and boys worked in fields or fishing, while also migrating at times to obtain work, all of which inhibited school attendance and learning. Finally, girls did not feel their parents, and to a lesser extent their teachers, supported their learning. In Bangladesh, PCTFI’s educational innovation has two main foci: building SMC and teacher capacity to address school quality issues related to teacher GSCCP, and to address gender issues in the community, including attitudes and safety issues. A critical component of capacity building has been establishing linkages with other projects/interventions in the same geographical area. The SMCs will coordinate and collaborate with parents, community, local government, and other projects/NGOs in order to establish a long-term, sustainable and coherent approach. The long-term impact of the capacity development of the SMC and teachers will be measured with regard to effects on teacher classroom practices; changes in stakeholders’ perceptions of girls’ educational capacity, and its effects on girls’ and boys’ attendance, retention and achievement in grades 3-5.
