According to Yahoo news, millions of girls worldwide are condemned
to lives of hardship because they don't go to school, an education gap that entrenches
broader extreme poverty. "The estimated 75 million girls missing from
classrooms across the world is a major violation of rights and a huge waste of
young potential," the child poverty alleviation group said in the report. A
total of one in three girls is denied education, but Plan's report focuses
especially on 39 million girls aged between 11 and 15, right on the cusp of
becoming young women, who are out of school. The situation continues to worsen;
new reports claimed that a 14-year-old Pakistani girl was gunned down this week
for her criticism of Taliban campaigns against girl's education -- underlined
the hugely positive impact that school can have on girls in poor countries. Plan
International CEO Nigel Chapman claimed that "An educated girl is less
vulnerable to violence, less likely to marry and have children when still a
child herself, and more likely to be literate and healthy into adulthood -- as
are her own children," "Her earning power is increased and she is
more likely to invest her income for the benefit of her family, community and
country. It is not an exaggeration to say educating girls can save lives and
transform futures."
Why should a
little girl be robbed of her education? Why should she have to sit back and
stay at home to take care of her household? Why can’t she too be educated among
the many other males her age? Why can’t she too better herself? I understand many families have different
reasons behind their action; for instance poor families pull daughters from
school out of fear for their health or safety. I understand that these families
fear the worse happening for their young daughters, pregnancy. In Ghana, 83 percent of parents interviewed
for the report said the risks of pregnancy were a disadvantage of school. The
report said that in Togo, 16 percent of children interviewed named a teacher
responsible for a classmate's pregnancy. That figure was 15 percent in Mali and
11 percent in Senegal. In Ghana, 75 percent of children said teachers were the
main source of school violence. These families fail to realize that by trying
to avoid one problem they are causing another, early marriage. US Secretary of
State Hillary Clinton who spoke out on the first UN day for girls, saying the
US government would expand efforts to keep girls in school and out of marriage
around the world. "Every year, 10 million girls under the age of 18 become
child brides, and many of them under the age of 16," Clinton said.
"Many of those girls are forced into early marriage, which robs them of
the opportunity to continue their education, and it threatens their health, and
it traps them in lives of poverty." If adolescent girls stay in school and
obtain real skills, research shows that they will earn more income in the
future, marry later and have fewer and healthier children,"
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