{"id":6327,"date":"2019-11-04T08:04:27","date_gmt":"2019-11-04T05:04:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/africasustainabilitymatters.com\/?p=6327"},"modified":"2026-01-11T05:30:39","modified_gmt":"2026-01-11T05:30:39","slug":"gender-inequality-in-education-is-still-an-issue-in-kenya-and-south-africa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/2019\/11\/04\/gender-inequality-in-education-is-still-an-issue-in-kenya-and-south-africa\/","title":{"rendered":"Gender Inequality In Education Is Still An Issue In Kenya And South Africa"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>By Beatrice Akala<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Women still aren\u2019t fully represented in higher education in\nKenya and South Africa, despite changes in law and policy over the years. This\nfailure of the education sector to harness and develop women\u2019s talents curtails\ntheir ability to contribute meaningfully to society.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The constitutions in both countries guarantee every citizen\na right to education. This is regardless of gender, sex, or social class. Higher\neducation in particular holds great value for the public good. It is&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/wol.iza.org\/articles\/female-labor-force-participation-and-development\/long\">central\nto the development<\/a>&nbsp;of individuals and nations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">But there is still&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/onlinelibrary.wiley.com\/doi\/abs\/10.1111\/j.1564-913X.1999.tb00386.x\">uneven\ndevelopment between genders<\/a>. In Kenya and South Africa women still&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.tandfonline.com\/doi\/abs\/10.1080\/18146627.2017.1406807\">struggle\nto access<\/a>&nbsp;institutions of higher education. And they also struggle to\nsucceed in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) related\ncourses, and to progress into postgraduate studies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">I address this in my&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.tandfonline.com\/doi\/abs\/10.1080\/18146627.2017.1406807\">research\npaper<\/a>. I focused on Kenya and South Africa because both countries have\nprogressive legal frameworks. My aim was to find out how these progressive\nframeworks translated into real life opportunities for women.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">My study found that although both countries have progressive\npolicies that support gender equality and equity, things are different on the\nground. Higher education still excludes many women, in particular those from\nmarginalised communities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Progressive policies such as gender equality policies and\nequity clauses have been enacted in both countries. But gender skewing is still\nprevalent in public higher education institutions in terms of throughput,\ncompletion rates, areas of study and enrolment in postgraduate studies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The difficulties particularly black women face in higher\neducation are a&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/ir-library.ku.ac.ke\/bitstream\/handle\/123456789\/14009\/Girl%27s%20and%20womens%27%20education%20in%20Kenya.pdf?sequence=1&amp;isAllowed=y\">continuation\nof the social conditions they live under<\/a>. This includes poverty, racism,\ngeographical positioning and institutional cultures that still have a&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.journals.ac.za\/index.php\/sajhe\/article\/view\/1521\">gender bias<\/a>,\nand sexism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><a href=\"https:\/\/theconversation.com\/gender-inequality-in-education-is-still-an-issue-in-kenya-and-south-africa-125747\">Read\nmore\u2026<\/a> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Beatrice Akala Women still aren\u2019t fully represented in higher education in Kenya and South Africa, despite changes in law and policy over the years. This failure of the education&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":6328,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":"","pagelayer_contact_templates":[],"_pagelayer_content":"","_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[101],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6327","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-international-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6327","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6327"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6327\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6328"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6327"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6327"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6327"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}