Access to Education: Barriers, Impact and Solutions

Jamaica’s literacy rate is 87.4, according to The United Nations Education, Scientific, and Cultural Organization. The literacy for girls is 91.6%. The rate is considered particularly high for a third world, developing country. Within the education system, females outnumber males in the classroom. Within universities alone, the ratio of males to females is 2:8. Primary and secondary education in Jamaica is for the most part free, with only a few hundred dollars to pay for miscellaneous items.
My community is within the rural setting. Within my community, most girls have attended secondary school but not all the girls in my community have made it up to that level or furthered their education. What is expected the girls is based on the long old adage of a woman’s place in the home. However it is not based on some cultural norm but it is of the matter of convenience. With the majority of the community within the lower socio-economic strata, girls learn about maintaining a household but also learn to earn a living so that their family may gain the basic necessities of food, clothing and shelter and in some instances life.
The mentality of the people within the community, the lower socio-economic class, significantly affects the access to education. Parents play an important role as their speech, actions and decisions influence the girls. Even though they may send their girls to school and say, “An education is important”, but because of their own action and lack of interest in their girl’s life, including school life, little comes from sending their girls to school. Though most girls may have attained a secondary school education, sometimes they do not aim to continue their studies and at most secondary education is just enough of an education to get by. This is not the mentality of a few but of many especially in the inner-city communities, where attaining a higher education is seen as trying to isolate oneselves and acting far superior than the rest of the community It is considered a social crime to gain a higher education and in some instances one is ostracized, taunted and eventually the families have to move away from the community because of the treatment they received that is not conducive to a happy family life.
The greatest challenge these girls face in accessing education is their level of self-esteem. Girls lack the self-confidence to continue their education, as not only do they see it as unimportant but as a burden that they would rather do without. They seek that boost to their self-esteem by participating in unprotected sex, prostitution, drugs that result in unwanted pregnancies and addictions that place their well-being in danger. By the time they have noticed that education is important, they neither have the resources nor the support to continue the education they have already started. Their self-esteem may take some shots because they lack positive role models to reinforce the good attributes they possess and to inspire them to continue the education they need to remove themselves from a cycle. The lack of positive role model or mentors only allows them to emulate those individuals who are featured on music videos or movies that portray as sex objects. Even though a number of persons from the community have made great strides and have attain their goals through education, their contribution to their community and the nation at large only begins and ends at their careers or jobs and only a few return due to a relative present within the community.
The barriers only continue the cycle of poverty already prevalent within the community. Education is the agent of change within the society and girls contribute up to 90% of their earning to their families. Without education to uplift girls and give them the resources to improve their circumstances, their circumstances will only continue through their children and to their children’s children. The issues that prevail among girls will only continue and without the resources and the understanding to acknowledge and counter these issues, they will only continue to prevail. This cycle can only be broken by girls and their access to education. It affects the society at large. With these barriers, the increase in social deviances only prevail as the probability of access to jobs and meaningful work decreases with the amount of education is one has obtained.
Overcoming these barriers is strengthened thorough mentorship whether done formally through a programme or informally thorough old acquaintances or relatives of the immediate family. It is through these linkages that girls have positive role models to emulate and come to understand the value of education through someone who understands the value and has used it to attain their greatest aspirations.