There is a strong relationship between the incidence of low GERs at primary level and
relative under-enrolment of girls. Countries where female enrolment is low are also
countries where overall gross enrolment rates are low (UNESCO 1991:54). The bigger
the disparity in enrolments between boys and girls the more likely it is that a smaller
proportion of primary school children will be in school (Colclough with Lewin 1 993:
Chapter 2).
Drop out is higher for girls than for boys in the majority of African and Asian countries
(UNESCO 1991:122 Table 5). Persistence rates to grade four are consistently lower for
females in countries in Asia and the Near East (ANE) though the gender gap is less than
that associated with enrolments. Enrolment rates for girls have been increasing faster
than for boys in the ANE region. However there is some evidence that improvements in
persistence have favoured boys rather than girls (Behrman 1991:8)
The proportion of teachers who are female has been increasing though in two regions
they remain a minority at the primary level. In Sub Saharan Africa and South Asia
females account for about 30% of all teachers at the first and second level. In all other
regions half or more of teachers are women at the first level (UNESCO 1991:81).
Adult illiteracy is substantially higher for women than for men. In low human
development countries, excluding India, the adult literacy rate has a mean of 59% for
males and 34% for females. In the least developed countries the figures are 47 and 24%
respectively and in Sub Saharan Africa the same pattern is apparent (56% to 34%). Of
59 low human development countries, fully 54 have male female disparities for literacy
of 10% or greater. In only one, Lesotho, does female literacy exceed male (UNDP
1991:129).
Data from the IEA studies show that boys outperform girls in mathematics achievement
at all ages in most countries. This is also the case in science subjects. The IEA Second
International Science study demonstrates that sex differences greatly favoured boys in
the countries with the lowest overall scores, in general and in terms of the performance
of both the bottom 20% and the top 20%. Though in some high scoring countries sex
differences were minimal (e.g. Hungary), in others (e.g. Japan), boys outperfommed
girls consistently at all levels of ability. Typically sex differences in performance are
greatest in physics and least in chemistry. Patterns do vary. It is not difficult to find
studies where male scores are as much as half a standard deviation greater than for girls
in lower secondary science (MSU 1986-1990). Analyses of O-level examination results
for Kenya, Zambia and Botswana demonstrate that girls perform less well than boys in
almost all subjects, but particularly in the physical sciences. In a small number of
countries (e.g. Trinidad and Tobago) there seems some evidence that girls perform
consistently better than boys in all types of schools and at all grade levels in science
(Kutnick and Jules, 1988).