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 The most problem of education inequality in the world.

 

 

Malcolm X once said that “Education is the passport to the future.”

But what if some passports are better than others,

giving the holder access to better schools and teachers

and, in turn, a more prosperous future?

These inequalities have been around long before Covid-19,

and yet, the pandemic has both exacerbated them and made them more visible.

While the standard of education varies greatly globally,

education inequality happens at the local level in all countries.

For example, only four out of every 100 children in Africa

is expected to enter a graduate and postgraduate institution,

compared to 14 out of 100 in South and West Asia

and 36 out of 100 in Latin America.

Even in developed countries, the quality of schooling can differ greatly,

whether rich or poor.

High national wealth then, is no guarantee of high equality.

The U.K., Germany and the U.S. are among the richest countries in the world, but all three rank poorly

on an educational inequality league table of 41 of the world’s richest countries.

By the middle of secondary school, educational inequalities are worse

than in other countries with much smaller economies such as Latvia, Spain and Estonia.

However, research has shown that child development is linked with income.

Unsurprisingly, the U.S. and the U.K. have some of the

highest levels of income inequality among OECD countries.

In the U.K., there has been a significant lack of social mobility since 1945.

As wealth inequality has remained high, there hasn’t been much change

in how well British children are doing at school.

In a 2019 report by the education coalition Fair Education Alliance,

pupils from disadvantaged backgrounds in the U.K. lag their peers by more than 8 months

in reading, writing and maths by age 11.

Children from persistently disadvantaged backgrounds are 22 months behind,

by the time they finish their school career. Small progress has been made

in helping some children almost beat the odds and overcome the barriers that face them

but the systemic underlying factors of our education system

still remain, which mean we’re not ever reaching the most persistently disadvantaged.

So, what are the contributing factors of education inequality among children?

According to Unicef, a child’s educational progress is linked to their family background.

What kind of jobs the parents have or whether the child is a first generation immigrant

can affect the likelihood of them continuing into higher education.

Inequality between genders is also apparent from a young age and tends to grow as children get older.

Reading abilities among girls are generally better than boys by the age of nine

and, in turn, that discrepancy is more likely to continue in education beyond secondary school.

And finally, which school you go to can have a significant impact on your academic performance.

In many countries, the debate on inequality in education is seen

through the prism of private schools versus state schools.

The U.K. is home to some very famous private schools like Eton College and Harrow School, behind me.

Of the 55 British prime ministers, nearly half were educated at just these two schools,

along with prominent actors, writers, scientists and royalty from across the world.

To compare, the entire state school education in England of a young person starting from nursery

costs an average of around $96,000. The annual school fees at Harrow, however,

cost around $56,000 for just one year of a child’s tuition.

But even that is dwarfed by private schools in Switzerland

such as Le Rosey which costs more than $135,000 per year.

Many believe that private education is at the root of inequality

and reduces the chances for those children who attend state schools.

The statistics tell us that educational privilege provides significant advantages and opens many doors.

In the U.K., nearly a third of members of parliament, two-thirds of the country’s top doctors

and 74% of judges were privately educated. The exam results also reflect the disparity.

In 2019, 45.7% of students at private schools in the U.K.

got A* or As in their final year exams compared to the national average of 25.5%.

But there are some state funded schools that buck that trend.

This is Mulberry School for Girls in east London.

It’s located in one of the most disadvantaged areas in the city,

yet the exam performance of students here is well above national average.

Vanessa Ogden is the headteacher here, and for the last 15 years,

has been instrumental in seeing many of her pupils overturn the odds.

As a headteacher, how do you, in your role, help to tackle education inequality?

The first really important way is to have students leave with a really great set of qualifications

and really great destinations to either university or apprenticeships

and so that’s the driving force, but of course,

inequality brings with it many structural difficulties in your life.

But while the pupils at Mulberry School have outperformed their peers for many years,

the Covid-19 pandemic may have undone much of that work.

We know from the research that Covid-19 has disproportionately affected

people of Black, Asian and minority ethnic background and those are the families mainly that we serve

and so not only has there been real difficulty around finance and resources,

but also real difficulty around health. The very first thing that reared its head

was period poverty, female students not being able to get sanitary products.

We hadn’t realized that really in a way schools are the providers of some of those things.

Stationery as well. So if you don’t have money or if the shops are shut

and you don’t have stationery in the home.

And we lent out all the devices that we could, so that they could learn at home.

In terms of the reasons why Covid-19 has exacerbated the disadvantage gap,

one big reason is the digital divide, but it’s also a resource divide in general.

So some families might not have access to laptops to access online learning.

They might not have a lot of space. The little progress we have made over the last ten years

is likely to have been reversed by lockdown. So what was already a dire situation

has been turned into quite a crisis.

The pandemic also highlighted another aspect of education inequality: private tuition.

By mid-April, there were nationwide school closures in more than 190 countries,

affecting more than 1.5 billion learners.

This led to an unprecedented demand for online teaching.

Some online tutoring platforms saw the number of daily users increase by 1,125% in two weeks.

In Singapore, there have even been calls to ban the private tuition industry

in an attempt to close the achievement gap.

The Covid-19 pandemic also impacted students in the U.K. progressing to university.

Due to exams being canceled during the lockdown, results were given based on an algorithm,

that critics claimed dragged dow high-achieving pupils in low-achieving schools,

compounding the inequalities they face.

The Department of Education and the exam boards initially responded by claiming there was no bias,

whether on the grounds of deprivation, gender or ethnicity.

However, they eventually reversed their decision, with grades instead estimated by the students’teachers.

So, what can be done to reduce educational inequalities both here and around the world?

A former Singaporean education minister said in 2018 that there should be

a broader definition of merit to recognize a wider range of skills.

We should double up on meritocracy, broaden its definition

to embrace various talents and skills. We should not cap achievement at the top,

but try harder, work harder, to lift the bottom.

The Fair Education Alliance also believes there is too much reliance on exams

and that education should be more holistic to include building aptitude and values.

We want an education system which develops skills

and social and emotional competencies alongside academic attainment,

we want teachers and leaders to be rewarded for serving the most disadvantaged students,

we want to engage parents and communities from all backgrounds in the education system

and we want to prepare young people for what comes after school.

Education is a way out of difficult situations. It’s also a means of moving yourself up the tree

in terms of prosperity, and not just financial prosperity

but also your kind of spiritual and cultural prosperity as well.

It’s also the case that a policy that works in one country or region may not work in another.

Economic inequality, however, is likely to grow due to the Covid 19 pandemic.

This means that creating better education systems is increasingly important

so that a child’s starting point in life doesn’t determine their future.

You have to be an optimist,

otherwise you’d pack up and go home in education, you know, you have to believe there is hope. 

Thanks to CNBC International.