Educational situation in Africa

Educational attainment is low in African countries, especially in sub-Saharan
Africa, due to its relatively unstable economic conditions, conflicts, droughts,
and poverty levels. In addition, schools in Africa lack basic facilities including
access to electricity and potable water, and lack textbooks, appropriate
classroom sizes, and teachers’ numbers. Language is another problem hindering
the educational process. For example, South Africans speak 11 languages, so
students have great difficulty interpreting the questions and formulating their
answers. In addition to teachers’ neglect and lack of their practical knowledge of
the language. Therefore, students may perform poorly. Concerning girls
’education, there are nearly 9 million girls between the ages of 6 and 11are not
in school at all, compared to 6 million boys. By the time they become teenagers,
the exclusion rate for girls is 36% compared to 32% for boys.
South Africa ranks last out of 140 countries in terms of the quality of education
provided. Also, in South Africa, 25% of schools do not even offer mathematics in
grades 10 to 12. This confirms that school attendance by itself is not sufficient to
achieve the expected gains from education, such as enhancing cognitive skills
and increasing productivity in the workplace. Actually, the economically poorest
segments of society constitute the most deprived segments of education in
Africa. More than one-fifth of children between the ages of 6 and 11 are not in
the school, followed by approximately one-third of youth between the ages of
12 and 14. Moreover, almost 60% of young people between the ages of 15 and
17 are out of school. In each grade, 12 percent of children repeat the class
because they either fail the end-of-year exam or are unable to complete the
assigned grade sufficiently. Besides, the transition rate from primary to
secondary education is only 62% in sub-Saharan Africa, compared to 99% in
developed countries and 88% in developing countries in general.