Commonwealth Business Communications
  • HOME
  • ABOUT
  • COUNTRIES
    • AFRICA
      • BOTSWANA
      • CAMEROON
      • GAMBIA
      • GHANA
      • KENYA
      • KINGDOM OF eSWATINI
      • LESOTHO
      • MALAWI
      • MAURITIUS
      • MOZAMBIQUE
      • NAMIBIA
      • NIGERIA
      • RWANDA
      • SEYCHELLES
      • SIERRA LEONE
      • SOUTH AFRICA
      • TANZANIA
      • UGANDA
      • ZAMBIA
    • ASIA
      • BANGLADESH
      • BRUNEI DARUSSALAM
      • INDIA
      • MALAYSIA
      • MALDIVES
      • PAKISTAN
      • SINGAPORE
      • SRI LANKA
    • CARIBBEAN AND AMERICAS
      • ANTIGUA AND BARBUDA
      • BAHAMAS
      • BARBADOS
      • BELIZE
      • CANADA
      • DOMINICA
      • GRENADA
      • GUYANA
      • JAMAICA
      • SAINT LUCIA
      • ST KITTS AND NEVIS
      • ST VINCENT AND THE GRENADINES
      • TRINIDAD AND TOBAGO
    • EUROPE
      • CYPRUS
      • MALTA
      • UNITED KINGDOM
    • PACIFIC
      • AUSTRALIA
      • FIJI
      • KIRIBATI
      • NAURU
      • NEW ZEALAND
      • PAPUA NEW GUINEA
      • SAMOA
      • SOLOMON-ISLANDS
      • TONGA
      • TUVALU
      • VANUATU
  • AREAS OF WORK
    • GOVERNMENT
    • EDUCATION
    • HEALTH
    • ICT
    • INFRASTRUCTURE DEVELOPMENT
    • NATURAL RESOURCES
    • SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT GOALS
    • TRADE AND INVESTMENT
  • OUR PUBLICATIONS
    • CHOGM
      • COMMONWEALTH HEADS OF GOVERNMENT INTERIM REPORT 2020
      • THE COMMONWEALTH HEADS OF GOVERNMENT MEETING 2018 REPORT
      • THE COMMONWEALTH HEADS OF GOVERNMENT MEETING 2015 REPORT
      • THE COMMONWEALTH HEADS OF GOVERNMENT MEETING 2011 REPORT
      • THE COMMONWEALTH HEADS OF GOVERNMENT MEETING 2009 REPORT
    • EDUCATION
      • COMMONWEALTH EDUCATION REPORT 2019
    • HEALTH
      • COMMONWEALTH HEALTH REPORT 2020
    • MINISTERS
      • MINISTERS REFERENCE BOOK COMMONWEALTH 2017
      • MINISTERS REFERENCE BOOK COMMONWEALTH 2015
      • MINISTERS REFERENCE BOOK COMMONWEALTH 2014
      • COMMONWEALTH FINANCE MINISTERS REPORT 2012
    • TRADE AND INVESTMENT
      • AFRICA INFRASTRUCTURE INVESTMENT REPORT 2013
    • QUEEN AND COMMONWEALTH
      • QUEEN & COMMONWEALTH: 90 GLORIOUS YEARS
  • CONTRIBUTORS
  • THOUGHT LEADERSHIP
  • CONTACT US
Commonwealth Business Communications
Commonwealth Business Communications
  • HOME
  • ABOUT
  • COUNTRIES
    • AFRICA
      • BOTSWANA
      • CAMEROON
      • GAMBIA
      • GHANA
      • KENYA
      • KINGDOM OF eSWATINI
      • LESOTHO
      • MALAWI
      • MAURITIUS
      • MOZAMBIQUE
      • NAMIBIA
      • NIGERIA
      • RWANDA
      • SEYCHELLES
      • SIERRA LEONE
      • SOUTH AFRICA
      • TANZANIA
      • UGANDA
      • ZAMBIA
    • ASIA
      • BANGLADESH
      • BRUNEI DARUSSALAM
      • INDIA
      • MALAYSIA
      • MALDIVES
      • PAKISTAN
      • SINGAPORE
      • SRI LANKA
    • CARIBBEAN AND AMERICAS
      • ANTIGUA AND BARBUDA
      • BAHAMAS
      • BARBADOS
      • BELIZE
      • CANADA
      • DOMINICA
      • GRENADA
      • GUYANA
      • JAMAICA
      • SAINT LUCIA
      • ST KITTS AND NEVIS
      • ST VINCENT AND THE GRENADINES
      • TRINIDAD AND TOBAGO
    • EUROPE
      • CYPRUS
      • MALTA
      • UNITED KINGDOM
    • PACIFIC
      • AUSTRALIA
      • FIJI
      • KIRIBATI
      • NAURU
      • NEW ZEALAND
      • PAPUA NEW GUINEA
      • SAMOA
      • SOLOMON-ISLANDS
      • TONGA
      • TUVALU
      • VANUATU
  • AREAS OF WORK
    • GOVERNMENT
    • EDUCATION
    • HEALTH
    • ICT
    • INFRASTRUCTURE DEVELOPMENT
    • NATURAL RESOURCES
    • SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT GOALS
    • TRADE AND INVESTMENT
  • OUR PUBLICATIONS
    • CHOGM
      • COMMONWEALTH HEADS OF GOVERNMENT INTERIM REPORT 2020
      • THE COMMONWEALTH HEADS OF GOVERNMENT MEETING 2018 REPORT
      • THE COMMONWEALTH HEADS OF GOVERNMENT MEETING 2015 REPORT
      • THE COMMONWEALTH HEADS OF GOVERNMENT MEETING 2011 REPORT
      • THE COMMONWEALTH HEADS OF GOVERNMENT MEETING 2009 REPORT
    • EDUCATION
      • COMMONWEALTH EDUCATION REPORT 2019
    • HEALTH
      • COMMONWEALTH HEALTH REPORT 2020
    • MINISTERS
      • MINISTERS REFERENCE BOOK COMMONWEALTH 2017
      • MINISTERS REFERENCE BOOK COMMONWEALTH 2015
      • MINISTERS REFERENCE BOOK COMMONWEALTH 2014
      • COMMONWEALTH FINANCE MINISTERS REPORT 2012
    • TRADE AND INVESTMENT
      • AFRICA INFRASTRUCTURE INVESTMENT REPORT 2013
    • QUEEN AND COMMONWEALTH
      • QUEEN & COMMONWEALTH: 90 GLORIOUS YEARS
  • CONTRIBUTORS
  • THOUGHT LEADERSHIP
  • CONTACT US

COUNTERING LEARNING POVERTY FROM COVID-19

  • CBC News Team
Total
0
Shares
0
0
0

School closures due to COVID-19 have left most students on the planet out of school – 1.6 billion students at the peak in April 2020.  This global shock to all education systems is being followed by a deep recession.  Without remedial action when students start returning to school, a new World Bank report estimates a loss of $10 trillion dollars in earnings over time for this generation of students, and countries will be driven off-track to achieving their Learning Poverty goals.

“Not being able to attend school impacts children in many ways: children don’t have an opportunity to learn, they may miss their most nutritious meal of the day, and too many students – especially girls – may lose out on the opportunity to complete their education, which will prevent them from achieving their potential,” stressed Annette Dixon, World Bank Vice President for Human Development.

“Without rapid, decisive, and coordinated action, the crisis threatens to pose a huge setback to hard-won gains in human capital, irreversibly damaging the lifelong opportunities of millions of children.”

Before the crisis, students were completing an average of 11.2 years of schooling throughout their school-age lives. However, when adjusted for the quality of learning, that amounted to only 7.9 years of schooling.  According to Simulating COVID-19 impacts on learning and schooling outcomes: A set of global estimates, 5 months of school closures due to COVID-19 will result in an immediate loss of 0.6 years of schooling adjusted for quality, bringing the effective learning that a student can achieve down from 7.9 years to 7.3 years.

Prior to the outbreak of the global coronavirus pandemic, the world was already struggling with a learning crisis, with 53 percent of children in low- and middle-income countries living in Learning Poverty – being unable to read and understand a simple text by age 10.

“The effects being simulated show a potential substantial setback to the goal of halving the number of learning poor by 2030 unless drastic remedial action is taken,” emphasized Jaime Saavedra, World Bank Global Director for Education.

“We were already living a learning crisis before the pandemic. With the spread of the coronavirus, the learning crisis will be even deeper – the baseline from which we need to accelerate and improve learning is now even more challenging. Moreover, we were already living in a world where opportunities were highly unequal; now those disparities are more profound, as poorer children would have had fewer opportunities to maintain any engagement with the learning process.”

School closures will impact learning across the system.  In the case of lower secondary students, the share of students that do not attain the minimum competencies can increase from 40% to 50% because of the immediate shocks.

Compounding this, according to the report, as of the latest GDP projections, close to 7 million students from primary and secondary education could drop out of school due to the income shock of the pandemic alone, and this number is likely to be revised further upwards as estimates of the magnitude of this economic crisis are revised.

The report says that the combination of being out of school and the loss of family livelihoods caused by the pandemic may leave girls especially vulnerable, and may exacerbate exclusion and inequality – particularly for persons with disabilities and other marginalized groups.

In the absence of effective compensatory action, school closures lasting 5 months and the unfolding economic shock could result, on average, in a reduction of $872 in yearly earnings for each student from today’s cohort in primary and secondary school.  This is equivalent to approximately $16,000 of lost earnings over a student’s lifetime, at present value.

These learning losses could translate over time into $10 trillion dollars of lost earnings for the global economy because of lower levels of learning, the lost months of schooling during the lockdown, and potential dropping out from school. This is approximately 16% of the total expenditures in educating these students over all their basic education.

Governments are pursuing a variety of approaches to mitigate school closures. The report notes that while some 130 governments are investing heavily in multiplatform remote learning and using this period to plan for when schools reopen, this is an opportunity to build an education system that is more resilient, adaptable to student needs, equitable, and inclusive, with a strong emphasis on the role of technology in teacher’s training at scale and ensuring learning continuity between the school and the home.

“We cannot waste this crisis,” stressed Saavedra. “This shock might have lasting negative impacts, but it must be an opportunity to accelerate, not go back to where we were before.  We will go to a new normal with a different understanding of the role of parents, teachers, and technology.  A new normal that should be more effective, more resilient, more equitable, and more inclusive.  We owe it to our children.”

Learn More: The World Bank

Photo by Niamat Ullah on Unsplash

Share this:

  • Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
CBC News Team

Previous Article

BUILD BACK BETTER

  • CBC News Team
Read More
Next Article

AFRICAN EDUCATION EXPERTS PUSH FOR MORE VIRTUAL LEARNING

  • CBC News Team
Read More
You May Also Like
Read More
  • EDUCATION

TWO-THIRDS OF POORER COUNTRIES ARE CUTTING EDUCATION BUDGETS

  • CBC News Team
  • 24 February 2021
Kenyan children using a laptop inside classroom, Kenya
Read More
  • EDUCATION
  • ICT
  • KENYA
  • NIGERIA
  • SOUTH AFRICA

SOUTH AFRICA’S TERACO EYES DATA CENTRES IN NIGERIA AND KENYA

  • CBC News Team
  • 23 February 2021
Read More
  • AFRICA
  • EDUCATION
  • ASIA
  • CARIBBEAN AND AMERICAS

TWO THIRDS OF AN ACADEMIC YEAR LOST ON AVERAGE WORLDWIDE

  • CBC News Team
  • 25 January 2021
Read More
  • BANGLADESH
  • EDUCATION

HELP FOR BANGLADESH TO PROVIDE EDUCATION TO POOR CHILDREN

  • CBC News Team
  • 19 January 2021
Read More
  • AFRICA
  • EDUCATION

CHILDREN CANNOT AFFORD ANOTHER YEAR OF SCHOOL DISRUPTION

  • CBC News Team
  • 12 January 2021
Read More
  • EDUCATION
  • GHANA

GHANA’S EXPERIENCE WITH RESULTS BASED FINANCING IN EDUCATION

  • CBC News Team
  • 5 January 2021
Read More
  • EDUCATION

ENDING DISCRIMINATION IN EDUCATION

  • CBC News Team
  • 11 December 2020
Read More
  • EDUCATION
  • CARIBBEAN AND AMERICAS

CARICOM EDUCATION MINISTERS REMINDED OF SECTOR’S IMPORTANCE IN POST COVID-19 RECOVERY

  • CBC News Team
  • 17 November 2020

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

OUR LATEST PUBLICATION

Subscribe to our Newsletter

PARTNER FOCUS
Recent Posts
  • Environment assembly meeting - The wind field of the mountain ridge. High angle aerial photography.
    UN ENVIRONMENT ASSEMBLY | AN URGENT CALL FOR ACTION TO SOLVE PLANETARY EMERGENCIES
  • Covid-19 vaccines caribbean - Medical injection vials: hand holding, close-up and colorful
    INDIA DONATING 500,000 COVID-19 VACCINES TO GUYANA, CARIBBEAN
  • Warning of travel restriction in airport stock
    GRENADA LAUNCHES COVID-19 VACCINATION PROGRAM FOR FRONT-LINE WORKERS
  • An African doctor in Ghana holding a covid 19 vaccine vial in his hands while wearing blue surgical gloves and surgical scrubs
    GHANA BECOMES RECIPIENT OF HISTORIC FIRST SHIPMENT OF COVAX VACCINE

Subscribe

Subscribe now to our newsletter

Commonwealth Business Communications
  • HOME
  • About
  • Contact
  • Terms of Use
  • Privacy Policy
  • Cookie Policy
© 2021 Commonwealth Business Communications Limited. All Rights Reserved.

Input your search keywords and press Enter.