Executive Director of the Africa Education Watch, Kofi Asare has underscored the need for Ghana to rigorously adopt the concept of Gender Transformative Education to deal with the menace of Gender inequality and its attendant effects.
Speaking on Metro TV’s Morning Rush, He intimated that negative stereotypes and attitudes are one of the major contributors to the promotion of Gender inequality and it can only be solved through the acceptance of gender transformative education concerning educational policies and teaching pedagogies.
“Now, these prohibitions or inhibitions, normally from negative stereotypes and norms and attitudes and practices both in school and around the school environment, including their community, and these factors work together against girls. It puts girls at the back banner, issues affecting them at the back banner, and rather projects boys and so gender transformative education simply says that beyond just the quantitative numbers, let’s look at how the broad policies in dedication, broad pedagogy.
So I’m talking about how teaching is done in the classroom and how learning is done. Teaching and learning approaches and methods, as also community attitudes can be changed to support the transformation of education, putting girl’s education at the forefront’’. He said.
Lois Aduamoah Addo, a women’s rights advocate working with Women in Law and Development in Africa (WILDAF-Ghana) also speaking on the show, reiterated the need for Ghana to adopt Gender transformative education as a panacea to gender inequality.
‘‘If we want to ensure that gender parity and equality, then we will need to take this whole gender transformative education concept very seriously. Many grade ladies are graduating from school but like you said, beyond the quantitative, I’m looking at the quality, the performance of women, looking at the relation, the ratio between men and women, looking at that, how are women able to access all these opportunities?
Then we need to take the concept of gender transformative education, the barrier that denies women and young girls access to education very seriously, so we can bridge the gap and ensure an environment that we are promoting gender equality and gender parity.’’ She said.
Gender transformative education is an approach to education that seeks to challenge and transform gender norms and stereotypes, and to promote gender equality. It focuses on creating an inclusive learning environment that is free from gender-based discrimination and violence and encourages students to explore and express their gender identities in a safe and supportive way.
By: Moses Desire Kouyo| Metro TV| Accra
