International Literacy Day
International Literacy Day is celebrated each year on September 8. Since it was launched in 1965, it has been an opportunity for showcasing and encouraging literacy training efforts and progress around the world.
For ADEA and its Working Group on Non-Formal Education (WGNFE) 2014 is a special year as one of its closest partners, the Association for the Promotion of Non-Formal Education (APENF), has received the UNESCO Confucius Award for its outstanding work in favor of women living in extreme poverty.
In sub-Saharan Africa, illiteracy remains a serious problem despite decades of efforts:
- In 2011, more than 23% of school-age children (i.e. nearly 30 million children) were still excluded from school. In 2013, Burkina Faso had more than 1,010,000 children in this situation; Mali, more than 845,000; and Niger, 950,000.
- In 2009, UNESCO reported that more than 21 million teenagers (15 to 21 years of age) were out of school in sub-Saharan Africa.
- In addition 153 million adults aged over 21 are illiterate, of whom 60% were women.
These people are exposed to unemployment, delinquency, prostitution, precarious health and hygiene, lack of security, and recruitment by groups that maintain armed conflicts in Africa.
ADEA has made literacy an important priority. In developing activities in this area, it has taken care to promote the democratization of access to education and the right to education. It encourages literacy that is functional and useful to learners, participatory, partnership based, integrating the use of new technologies and inspired from the best practices worldwide.
In 2014, WGNFE has promoted and supported literacy in four main areas:
• It contributes to the development of frameworks for cooperation in literacy such as the Inter-Country Quality Node on Literacy and African Languages, which seeks to pool the literacy initiatives of 14 African countries;
• Analytical work is carried out to generate new ideas and improve literacy practices. The peer reviews conducted in Burkina Faso are an example of this;
• It is also involved in literacy initiatives undertaken by member countries and partners. WGNFE contributed to the launch of the special literacy campaign in Burkina Faso, to the deliberations on the development of a professional master’s degree on non-formal education in West Africa, to the deliberations on the “Educate a Child” program financed by Qatar in several Saharan and Sahelian countries, and to the education program for cross-border nomadic groups in West and Central Africa.
• WGNFE also participates actively in communication and information campaigns on best practices in literacy, which are disseminated through the ADEA and WGNFE websites, WGNFE’s Newsletter Kibaré and the ADEA Bulletin.
In this way, ADEA contributes to the development of functional literacy that reaches those outside the “formal” education system. Without them, one can hardly speak of Education for All.
Read more on the ADEA Working Group on Non Formal Education (WGNFE) and the Inter-Country Quality Node on Literacy and National Languages (ICQNLNL)
