Gender
The right to education is regarded as necessary for women in the Middle East and North Africa. The importance of education for women is to enable them become good mothers for the future and active members in society. While some women perceive that education is their gateway to a better life in which they are able to understand their human rights and subsequently protect themselves against gender discrimination, others believe that educated women are more successful in raising a new generation.
In the first half of the 1990s Muslim states increased girls enrollment in primary schools by two per cent, a rate four times higher than the average rate of school-age girls enrollment in developing countries. The rise of girls participation in primary schools aimed at wiping the widespread claims that Islamic rules restricted female access to education.
In the Islamic Republic of Iran, the primary school enrollment rate for girls has increased from 80 to 96 per cent in 1986. Similarly, in rural areas, girls enrollment in primary schools has climbed from 60 to 80 per cent in the late 1990s. In the case of Iran, political commitment to achieve a universal compulsory education in Iran has influenced educational quality. Correspondingly, gender gap in school enrollment has significantly decreased.
In addition, several regimes in the Arab world have stressed the importance to improve female's access to education and attempted to reduce gender gaps at different educational levels. Indeed, it is predicted that by the year 2010, Arab countries can reach 70 per cent of literacy rate as result of the sustained improvement of education especially with regards to women. Tunisia stands as an illustrative example of a successful policy that has started in 1956. It aimed at reducing gender gaps. The government's liberal policy towards women has influenced women's status in the country and reduced gender inequality in access to education.
The significant shifts in girls enrollment rates in compulsory schools were experienced by other countries in the MENA region. From 1960 to 1988, girls enrollment rates in Syria, Libya and Iraq have climbed correspondingly from 44 per cent to 94 per cent(Syria), from 26 to 90 per cent (Libya) and from 39 to 88 per cent(Iraq). According to the World Bank, the wider gender gaps across the MENA region are found in Yemen, Morocco and Egypt. In Egypt, more than 600.000 girls aged between 6 to 10 do not go to school. The majority of these uneducated girls are concentrated in rural areas, especially in Upper Egypt. Such phenomenon resulted from the low quality of the national educational system and its provided services in rural areas. This was also backed with the socioeconomic difficulties in the rural areas of Egypt where it is very difficult to afford for basic educational materials.
Read more about this topic: Education In The Middle East And North Africa
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“Most women of [the WW II] generation have but one image of good motherhood—the one their mothers embodied. . . . Anything done “for the sake of the children” justified, even ennobled the mother’s role. Motherhood was tantamount to martyrdom during that unique era when children were gods. Those who appeared to put their own needs first were castigated and shunned—the ultimate damnation for a gender trained to be wholly dependent on the acceptance and praise of others.”
—Melinda M. Marshall (20th century)
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—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)