Kosovo Human Development Report 2010 - UNDP Kosovo - United ...

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strate a wide range of learning needs. Some may experience difficulties with reading, writing, or mathematics. Others may belong to ethnic minorities and not speak or write well in Albanian. Others may be from poor households that have difficulties buying food, footwear and books. Wheelchair users may need special physical access to schools and universities. The mechanisms that shut many of these students out of the education process in Kosovo have unique historical/socio-cultural and governance roots, namely: (i) Socio-cultural drivers • Inter-generational poverty and unemployment: 48.6 percent of children 0-19 in Kosovo are classified as poor. 81 As elsewhere, poverty – itself a product of low education – makes it very hard for children to reach the classroom. For those poor children who do attend, drop-out rates are higher and learning less easy. Poor children are excluded in a number of ways. Their families may not be able to afford even minimal outlays for books, clothing and meals. They may be obliged to work to supplement low family incomes. Their nutritional status essential for brain development and learning energy is often poorer than that of their counterparts. Their feelings of marginalization and relative worthlessness can make school a painful experience. Since poverty and lack of access to factor markets is directly correlated with education levels, their parents are unlikely to have high education standards themselves. Thus, there is often no role model in the household to encourage Kosovo’s poor children to acquire an education. Prioritization of 56 | KOSOVO HUMAN DEVELOPMENT REPORT 2010 education as a factor in household expenditures is likely to be lower among poor families. 82 • A historical legacy of exclusion: Kosovo’s legacy of division greatly complicates the provision of equal opportunity to all potential students. 83 Organization of a parallel educational system by the Kosovo- Serb minority after the end of the armed conflict in Kosovo, as a form of self-exclusion from the formal educational system of Kosovo, is one of the biggest challenges to the functioning of an educational system in Kosovo as a whole. At the same time, this parallel system also prevents the collection of statistics on inclusion of the Kosovo-Serb students at all levels of education. • Low cultural prioritization of early childhood learning: early childhood learning has been shown worldwide to promote higher school attendance and better quality of education. However, Kosovo has an alarmingly low rate of pre-school enrolment. Kindergartens and preschools are not only not part of the learning culture, but out of reach for the most vulnerable and those least likely to stay in school. Only 5,051 (around 12 percent) of preschool children were in early learning in 2006-2007. 84 Children residing in rural areas often do not have access to preschool education programmes at all which negatively affects their early learning. 85 While 98.2 percent of children included in the preschool institutions are Kosovo-Albanians, only 1.7 percent are from other ethnic groups. In smaller municipalities (Malishevë/ Malisevo, Dragash/Dragas, Junik, and Mamusha), there are no children reported to be enrolled in preschool institutions. • Discrimination in a vacuum of social cohesion: above all, inclu-
sive education depends on deep cooperation between families, societies and governments to ensure that this fundamental right is met. In Kosovo, social cohesion is weak and fractured. Societies reject the full participation of minority groups (particularly RAE communities), hide disabled children and have little trust in their governance structures. The concept of education as a driver of life opportunity is also threatened by a climate of patronage, corruption and widespread unemployment. True mobilization of public, private, voluntary, economic and human resources towards education for all is therefore still an unrealized dream. (ii) Governance drivers • Weak accountability of policy implementation: the MEST (Ministry of Education, Science and Technology) has made an effort to enshrine principles of inclusion in its sectoral policies. 86 For example, municipalities with minority communities are entitled to additional rights in education - such as the organization of higher education institutions (e.g., University in North Mitrovica). However, education laws, regulations and strategies often remain statements of good intentions without any follow-up implementation or proper reporting. These shortfalls are partially attributable to unrealistic planning, and also to limited sector-level implementation capacities. Mechanisms for policy implementation and adequate budget planning are lacking. This reflects a fundamental contradiction between official political commitment to an integrated and non-discriminatory educational system and the reality on the ground. As a consequence, instead of addressing the fundamental barriers to implementing new educational legislation, policymakers rather redraft or amend laws repeatedly. 87 In addition, the lack of census data makes it impossible to accurately calculate the percentage of children enrolled into the education establishments in Kosovo. The numbers range from 95-104 percent. Data on ethnic minorities and children with special needs are almost non-existent and unreliable. • Limited budget allocation for education and in particular for measures targeting social inclusion: access to quality education depends mostly on the availability of finance, infrastructure, policies and programmes supporting quality inclusive education. With this in mind, Kosovo’s education sector budget falls far short of needs. In 2001, Kosovo allocated around 3.8 percent of GDP to education, a figure comparable with low to medium income countries. 88 From 2004 to 2006 Kosovo’s budget allocations for education increased from 3.9 percent to 4.4 percent of GDP. 89 However, in 2009 the budget allocation for education declined to 3.7 percent of GDP. 90 Although this is close to the EU average (4-5 percent of GDP), the actual amount allocated to the education system is insufficient considering the sector’s needs. Insufficient budget allocations have a negative impact on the ratios of teachers to students in Kosovo. The teacher-student ratio in Kosovo is 18.2 to one in elementary, and 20.3 to one in secondary schools (MEST, 2009), an unbalanced ratio when compared with other countries in the Western Balkans. In Serbia, for example, the teacherstudent ratio in 2006 was 13.8 to one in elementary and 10.7 to one in the secondary education. 91 In developed countries the teacher-student ratio is ACCESS TO EDUCATION AND EXCLUSION | 57
Page 1:
The views expressed in this report
Page 4 and 5: VI specific difficulties that group
Page 7 and 8: Abbreviations ALMP Active Labour Ma
Page 9 and 10: The UN’s Human Development Report
Page 11 and 12: agents without any true sense of ow
Page 13: Contents Foreword .................
Page 16 and 17: to its society. A dramatic effort t
Page 18 and 19: entated basis for examination of so
Page 20 and 21: services. The chapter examines spec
Page 22 and 23: Table 1.1 Low income and the launch
Page 24 and 25: Ineffective institutional support m
Page 26 and 27: 1 2 3 4 “The basic purpose of dev
Page 28 and 29: Table Human Development Index (HDI)
Page 31 and 32: CHAPTER 2 Economic and labour marke
Page 33 and 34: managed to increase its public expe
Page 35 and 36: absence of material well-being and
Page 37 and 38: not protect from exclusion from goo
Page 39 and 40: more than half of its members who a
Page 41 and 42: FIGURe 75 percent of male youth age
Page 43 and 44: Education: the probability of exclu
Page 45 and 46: lower access to services than urban
Page 47 and 48: contract enforcement and privatizat
Page 49 and 50: produce a high risk of social exclu
Page 51 and 52: 3.1 Access to education and exclusi
Page 53: ns of exclusion as well the composi
Page 57 and 58: point these groups more precisely,
Page 59 and 60: FIGURe 3.2 2004/05 2006/07 Grade 1
Page 61 and 62: Kosova Education Centre (KEC) was i
Page 63 and 64: learning in its legislative framewo
Page 65 and 66: 4.1 CHAPTER 4 Health care services
Page 67 and 68: ported deaths. However, Kosovo face
Page 69 and 70: the same levels of difficulties as
Page 71 and 72: to healthcare. For many, it is simp
Page 73 and 74: 4.4 Promoting inclusion in healthca
Page 75 and 76: 5.1 Political participation and exc
Page 77 and 78: for all Kosovans, the level of publ
Page 79 and 80: the Department for Registration and
Page 81 and 82: were women. 188 In minority communi
Page 83 and 84: with the mayor and his job, two thi
Page 85 and 86: Table 5.6 % of respondents attendin
Page 87: public meetings are not always the
Page 90 and 91: • and created Human Development S
Page 92 and 93: tion against certain ethnic groups
Page 94 and 95: passes poor health and education va
Page 96 and 97: and cross-ministerial collaboration
Page 98 and 99: to the success of this scheme, by,
Page 100 and 101: The under-five infant mortality rat
Page 103 and 104: Human Development Index according t
Page 105 and 106:
Introduction 1 Preparing for a futu
Page 107 and 108:
65 USAID and Swiss Cooperation Offi
Page 109:
gagement.pdf. 156 See Civic Capacit
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