Progress in literacy and learning, especially through universal primary education, has done more to advance human conditions than perhaps any other policy. Our generation has the possibility of becoming the first generation ever to offer all children access to good quality basic education. But it will only happen if we have the political commitment -- at the country as well as at the international level -- to give priority to achieve this first in human history. And it will only happen if also those who cannot afford to pay school fees can benefit from a complete cycle of good quality primary education. Investment in good quality fee-free primary education should be a cornerstone in any government's poverty reduction strategy.

Presents current thought and pertinent analysis on Commonwealth issues and challenges. In-depth articles and case studies focus on topical issues, including the theme of the 2007 Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting: 'Transforming Commonwealth Societies to achieve political, economic and human development.'

An examination of families and schools in South Africa, revealing how the marketisation of schooling works to uphold the privilege of whiteness.

"The report, "'I Had a Dream to Finish School': Barriers to Secondary Education in Tanzania," examines obstacles, including some rooted in outmoded government policies, that prevent more than 1.5 million adolescents from attending secondary school and cause many students to drop out because of poor quality education. The problems include a lack of secondary schools in rural areas, an exam that limits access to secondary school, and a discriminatory government policy to expel pregnant or married girls"--Publisher's description.

Opinions and policies on the development of private education in Sub-Saharan Africa are changing. This book attempts to review existing literature, theories, and concepts related to recent trends in the development and financing of private education in Sub-Saharan countries. Eleven chapters address the following topics: (1) introduction; (2) a retrospective on private education development and financing in Sub-Saharan Africa; (3) looking into the definition of private education; (4) different types of private education in Sub-Saharan Africa; (5) share of private education in total enrollment; (6) private education as an alternative to the provision of public education; (7) private education as a competitor for private and public funds for education; (8) comparative cost-efficiency and cost-effectiveness; (9) school choice and parents' attitudes; (10) from theories to present African realities; and (11) the public policy toward private education in Africa. Implications for education-policy research in Sub-Saharan Africa are described. Eight appendices contain an index to Sub-Saharan countries mentioned in the text, selected African countries' examples on private-education development and financing, statistics on private enrollment as percentage of total enrollment, suggested typology of private schools, comparative analysis of advantages and disadvantages of private education as compared to public education, private consumption in Sub-Saharan Africa, relative price of private consumption of education in selected African countries in 1993, and factors determining the volume of tuition fees in profit-making schools. (Contains 127 references.) (RT)

Education in Sub-Saharan Africa: A Comparative Analysis takes stock of education in Sub-Saharan Africa by drawing on the collective knowledge gained through the preparation of Country Status Reports for more than 30 countries.

A bold call to deromanticize education and reframe universities as terrains of struggle between alternative modes of studying and world-making Higher education is at an impasse. Black Lives Matter and #MeToo show that racism and sexism remain pervasive on campus, while student and faculty movements fight to reverse increased tuition, student debt, corporatization, and adjunctification. Commentators typically frame these issues as crises for an otherwise optimal mode of intellectual and professional development. In Beyond Education, Eli Meyerhoff instead sees this impasse as inherent to universities, as sites of intersecting political struggles over resources for studying. Meyerhoff argues that the predominant mode of study, education, is only one among many alternatives and that it must be deromanticized in order to recognize it as a colonial-capitalist institution. He traces how key elements of education—the vertical trajectory of individualized development, its role in preparing people to participate in governance through a pedagogical mode of accounting, and dichotomous figures of educational waste (the “dropout”) and value (the “graduate”)—emerged from histories of struggles in opposition to alternative modes of study bound up with different modes of world-making. Through interviews with participants in contemporary university struggles and embedded research with an anarchist free university, Beyond Education paves new avenues for achieving the aims of an “alter-university” movement to put novel modes of study into practice. Taking inspiration from Black Lives Matter, Occupy Wall Street, and Indigenous resurgence projects, it charts a new course for movements within, against, and beyond the university as we know it.