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Education is a universal human right. Article 26(1) of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights of 1948 states "everyone has the right to education". Education is a recognized human right in other international agreements such as the International Convention on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (1976) and the Convention on the Rights of the Child (1989). Yet millions of school-age children all over the world do not go to school and many adults are illiterate.
As a response to the dire educational circumstances of many children and adults particularly in developing countries, the World Conference on Education for All took place in Jomtien, Thailand, in 1990. Delegates from 155 countries and representatives from some 150 organizations set a goal to universalize primary education and massively reduce illiteracy by 2000 by establishing mechanisms to systematically address the issues.
Despite gains made in enrolment since 1990, the reality is that more than 100 million primary school age children are not in school. Three-quarters of these children live in sub-Saharan Africa and South and West Asia. While there has been a narrowing of the gender gap, for every 100 boys out of school there are 117 girls who are also out of school*. These figures include not only children who have never attended school but also those who dropped out before completing elementary school.
With the start of the new millennium in 2000, a blueprint for eradicating poverty was developed in the form of the United Nations Millennium Development Goals. One of the eight goals is to achieve universal primary education with all children throughout the world going to school. All of the world's countries and leading development institutions agreed to work towards meeting these goals by 2015. Seven years have passed since these goals were agreed upon and 2015 is only eight years. Efforts by all countries have to be stepped up if the Millennium Development Goals are to be met. We must take this opportunity to teach our students about Canada's role within the international community and give them the opportunity to advocate on behalf of the less fortunate children of the world.