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From the individual to the institutional:
Support for girls education in Timor-Leste

	Children from Bogoro kindergarten, Liquisa. Photocredit: UNIFEM/Jennifer Ward.

Outside the tiny one-room kindergarten in the village of Bogoro, in rural Liquisa, Timor-Leste, twenty children exuberantly perform ‘heads, shoulders, knees and toes’ in Tetun, the local language. They soon become out of sync, and a small girl bending down has to avoid her neighbor’s elbow, hovering at shoulder height.

That there is a kindergarten at all in Bogoro is due to the efforts of one incredible and resilient woman. Madalena Bi Dau Soares, who fought for independence during the Indonesian occupation, uses her meager veteran’s pension to run the ‘Bermeta Haburas’ kindergarten for the children in her village.

“I wanted to achieve something good, leaving a mark in the community. After fighting for independence, men found other things to do, I wanted the same for me,” Soares, affectionately known as ‘Mana Kassian’ said.

Mana Kassian’s dedication impressed Ameerah Haq, the Special Representative of the UN Secretary General in Timor-Leste, who personally visited and made a donation to the kindergarten to commemorate International Women’s Day. “Mana Kassian’s actions carry the most important message to all: only through education will Timor-Leste’s women and girls, and future generations, have the chance to reach their full potential and enjoy equal opportunities to secure improved quality of life” Ms. Haq said.

Female education in Timor-Leste is a tale of two schools. The literacy gap between girls and boys is fast closing, due to Government efforts in primary education. But the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women, which made its first assessment on Timor-Leste last year, noted with concern the high dropout rates of girls in secondary and tertiary education. Although one in three students in higher education is female, only 20% of these women go on to finish their studies.

Mana Kassian with SRSG Ameerah Haq celebrating International Women’s Day. Photocredit: UNIFEM/Jennifer Ward.

UNIFEM, through its Gender and Development Advisor Muriel Lauvige, has assisted the Ministry of Education in pinpointing why so many girls do not complete higher education. The Ministry’s comprehensive Gender Assessment released in 2009, identified a number factors that disrupt female education including, access to schools, cultural attitudes towards women and early marriage and pregnancy.

Their joy in the kindergarten belies the fact that the children of Bogoro have bleak educational prospects. Of the 71 secondary schools in the country, only two are in Liquisa. If no new high schools are built, many of the children will simply be unable to finish their education.

In some areas of Timor-Leste, if a teenager becomes pregnant or married, she is expected to leave school and focus on her new family life. Non-formal education, the only educational option after dropping out, focuses on basic literacy, well below the needs of a high-school student. As Timor-Leste has the highest teen pregnancy rate in Southeast Asia, the doors of education become firmly closed for many girls.

Mr Soares head of Policy and Planning at the Ministry of Education said that the Gender Assessment was crucial for the Ministry’s future planning, including tackling problems such as the female dropout rate. ‘It has helped identify gaps and can guide us in stepping forward’ he said.

Timorese girls face many challenges in their quests for education. It will be this combined commitment of institutions, development agencies such as UNIFEM and inspiring individuals such as Mana Kassian that will secure a brighter future for Timorese girls. More than that, Mr Soares believes that gender mainstreaming in education will have a long term positive effect on how women are viewed in Timorese society, ‘awareness will come through education. By promoting gender issues in schools, they will be reduced in the future.’

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