Gender and Education in Tanzania
The education system in Tanzania, during the past 20 years, has expanded in secondary school and university enrollments; however, there are not enough schools to satisfy the demand of a growing nation. As a result, there tends to be a marked gender, regional and district bias. Mostly the male gender is favored.
Statistics from 2001 show that only 23% of students graduate to secondary education, and of these, only 20% in Form IV attain good grades, 55% pass, and 25% fail. The female: male ratio for Form IV in private schools was 44:56, for public schools it was 35:56. For Form VI it was even lower, 22:78 and 24:76 respectively. This ratio has not improved since 1993. At that time, secondary schools ratios were 45:55 for private schools and 41:59 for public schools.
Gender and the District
The general feature of secondary education in the Bagamoyo district is that sex ratio fovours boys. The reason for this is entrance competition due to the shortage of secondary schools, early marriages for girls for the sake of securing a good dowry, a prevalence of unwanted pregnancies, the need of girls to help mothers with homestead domestic chores and parental passiveness, cultural suspicions and fear of the effects education will have on their daughters.
In most villages of south-eastern Bagamoyo, more than 90% of the population is Muslim, and here strong socio-religious pressures deter families from sending their female children to secondary schools. This belief overrides the logic and recognition that education has had positive effects on promotion of maternal and child health, on family welfare, and in economic, social and political benefits.
Gender and Policy
Tanzania’s Constitution, advocates for equal rights between men and women and Tanzania is a signatory to the global Convention of the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW). In 1992, Tanzania established a policy on Women in Development, and has since actively promoted efforts to re-align the gender bias in all walks of life.
The goals set in the Tanzania Development Vision 2025, which envisages a situation whereby “All Tanzanian’s of all races, gender and creed will be living in a substantially developed society with high quality livelihood”, will most certainly be compromised if the gender imbalance in education is not addressed. This couples well with the National Poverty Eradication Strategy (NPES) and the Agricultural Sector Development Strategy (ASDS), which recognize women, have a dynamic, economic and leadership role to play in nation building.
