How education budgets and plans target the most marginalized

The international community and national governments have committed to education for all children. Goal 4 of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development is to “ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all”(SDG 4).

Though there has been considerable progress in education enrolment over the last decade, 263 million children remain out of school globally,and they are most likely to be girls, children from the poorest backgrounds, from ethnic, cultural or linguistic minority groups, living in conflict, and living with disabilities. Even where children can access schools, education can lack relevance, reinforce bias and discrimination, and fail to teach fundamental literacy and numeracy skills needed for children and young people to become socially and economically active citizens. National governments, supported by the international community, must develop strategies and commit resources to overcoming these challenges and ensure that SDG 4 targets, particularly those targets focused on equity and inclusion, are achieved.

Plan International believes that education should be available and accessible to all children on the basis of equal opportunity and non-discrimination. Every child must be able to access and complete an inclusive, quality pre-primary, primary and secondary education in order to meet global commitments. It is unacceptable that certain groups of children are prevented from being able to access, transition and complete a quality education due to their gender, nationality, ethnic or social origin, religion or political preference, age or disability. Such barriers are discriminatory and must be tackled through effective policies, sector plans and adequate funding. Plan International prioritizes girls’ education and gender equality in and through education as a key issue that requires advancing in order to address inequality and target the most marginalized.

Assessing transparency and inclusivity

This report summarizes findings from a review of available budget and planning documents from 12 low-income countries. The review assessed the extent to which education systems plan to address the needs of and barriers facing groups typically excluded from education, identifying explicit commitments to inclusion in education through planned actions and budget allocations. The availability of documents varied between countries, but, where possible, included national budgets and budget narratives, education sector budgets, budget narratives and plans (see table 1). The goal was to better understand how governments target the most marginalized to access and complete quality, relevant education.

Original source and full report: Plan International
Published on 7 February 2018