UNESCO Rreleased its 2019 Global Education Monitoring ( GEM) Report. Know why it is so important for India.

• Recently UNESCO has released its 2019 Global Education Monitoring (GEM) report.
• According to the report, Eighty per cent of migrant children across seven Indian cities did not have access to education near worksites even as 40% of children from seasonal migrant households are likely to end up working rather than being in school, facing exploitation and abuse.

About UNESCO

• The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) is a specialized agency of the United Nations (UN) based in Paris.
• Its declared purpose is to contribute to peace and security by promoting international collaborationthrough educational, scientific, and cultural reforms in order to increase universal respect for justice, the rule of law, and human rights along with fundamental freedom proclaimed in the United Nations Charter.
• It is the successor of the League of Nations' International Committee on Intellectual Cooperation.
• UNESCO has 195 member states and ten associate members.

2019 GEM report

• The 2019 GEM Report continues its assessment of progress towards Sustainable Development Goal 4 (SDG 4) on education and its ten targets, as well as other related education targets in the SDG agenda.
• Its main focus is on the theme of migration and displacement.
• It presents evidence on the implications of different types of migration and displacement for education systems but also the impact that reforming education curricula and approaches to pedagogy and teacher preparation can have on addressing the challenges and opportunities posed by migration and displacement.

Key report findings

• According to the report, India, along with China, is home to some of the world’s largest internal population movements and the report highlights the steps India has taken to address it and challenges that remain.
• In the period between 2001 and 2011, inter-state migration rates doubled in India.
• The report shows that the scale of seasonal migration has a significant impact on education.
• Eighty per cent of migrant children across seven Indian cities did not have access to education near worksites even as 40% of children from seasonal migrant households are likely to end up working rather than being in school, facing exploitation and abuse.
• Further, an estimated 9 million people migrated between states annually from 2011 to 2016.
• Many people are also moving for seasonal work. In 2013, 10.7 million children aged between 6 and 14 lived in rural households with a family member who was a seasonal worker. This is particularly common within the construction industry.
• Among youth aged 15 to 19 who have grown up in a rural household with a seasonal migrant, 28% identified as illiterate or had an incomplete primary education.
• While warning of the negative impact on education for children who are left behind as their parents migrate, the report acknowledges the initiatives that India has taken to respond to the migrants’ education needs.
• The Unesco report also urges policy makers to strengthen public education for rural migrant children living in slums.

 

Steps already taken in this direction

• The Right to Education Act in 2009 made it mandatory for local authorities to admit migrant children.
• National-level guidelines were issued, allowing for flexible admission of children, providing transport and volunteers to support with mobile education, create seasonal hostels and aiming to improve coordination between sending and receiving districts and states.
• The report also notes how Indian states have responded to the issue.
  • Gujarat introduced seasonal boarding schools to provide migrant children with education and collaborated with NGOs to begin online tracking of the children on the move.
  • In Maharashtra, village authorities called upon volunteers to provide after-school psychosocial support to children who had been left behind by migrating parents.
  • Tamil Nadu provides textbooks in other languages to migrant children.
  • Odisha assumed responsibility of seasonal hostels run by NGOs and works with Andhra Pradesh to improve migrant well-being.

Note

• The report notes that most interventions are focused on keeping children in home communities instead of actively addressing the challenges faced by those who are already on the move.
• Furthermore, not all initiatives are successful.