Despite efforts in the last decade to get more children into school(1), many problems still persist. Of particular concern is the insufficient attention devoted to the quality of education.

It is not enough to send kids to school. A hungry child does not learn; a child that has the wrong teacher does not learn; a child that does not have a sheet of paper and a pencil can not write; a child that is affected by worms or any other disease can not learn.

Today, about 100 million children are still out of school, many do not complete primary school, enroll late and frequently repeat grades. For example in Burkina Faso, only about half of the children attend school and of these, less than half are girls. In Nicaragua, about 200,000 children aged 7-12 do not attend school and about 450,000 children under 7 do not receive any kind of education. In Pakistan, 6 million children aged between 5 and 9 are unable to attend school.

Today, many schools do not offer an adequate learning environment thus reducing the educational opportunities; most schools lack basic eating facilities; children often walk long distances to get to school where they arrive tired and hungry and then spend many hours without any access to food or water; they are unable to concentrate or to learn. Teachers are insufficiently trained; classes are ill equipped; there are no textbooks or other educational material. The combination of those factors explains why children’s performance is generally poor and when they get out of school they do not master a minimum set of cognitive skills(2).

Today, 57% of out-of-school children are girls; this gap is even more extreme at secondary level and in higher education.

Palms supports projects that increase the overall rate of enrollment and attendance in particular for girls. Food aid to poor households, or sometimes cash incentives have proven successful to increase girls’ attendance. This is the case in Pakistan where literacy among girls is half that of boys.

Palms also strongly supports schoolfeeding projects as they have clearly proven to increase the children’s performance in class and their overall nutrition. Furthermore, such projects serve as a platform for attracting other services such as health controls and vaccinations, deworming, safe water supply, latrines and in some countries, special prevention programs on HIV/AIDS. Furthermore, parents participate actively in those projects and help transporting food, supplying fresh vegetables and preparing meals.

With regard to the quality of education, Palms funds the provision of necessary learning materials and invests in teachers’ training. Of particular priority are projects that provide teachers with incentives to work in remote rural environments.

While these projects do not address the entire complex problems that affect education in poor countries, they do provide an answer to a very concrete, palpable set of problems that can not be ignored and have to be addressed TODAY.

• higher enrollment in particular for girls;
• better performance in class and reduced repetition rates;
• children in better health and free from illnesses such as parasites or respiratory diseases; hearing or vision problems are diagnosed and treated;
• teachers able to perform better with the right training, and the necessary learning material; and
• better educated children which can help them make better choices in life and protect them from HIV/AIDS and other infectious diseases.

In the longer term, by investing in education countries will have better economic growth. More people will be prepared to make informed choices, be fully participative in their communities, exercise their democratic rights, elect the right leaders and contribute for the world to become a better place for all.