In schools, homes and coffee houses across Turkey, the same question is being asked by teachers, journalists, local activists and religious leaders: “What will it take to get your daughter in school?”

Eleven per cent of girls in Turkey are still missing out on a primary education. But thanks to a major education campaign, over a quarter of a million children have enrolled in school since 2003 – and 177,000 of these are girls. Of these, 62,000 girls were enrolled in 2005 alone.

The campaign is part of the global effort to promote gender equality and achieve universal primary education for the 115 million primary-school-age children who remain out of school.

The Turkish campaign, dubbed ‘Let’s Go to School, Girls!’, depends on a vast network of volunteers who go door-to-door to lobby parents about the value of education. Volunteers are signing up and the programme has received support from prominent politicians, including the Prime Minister and his wife.

Local efforts

On a stop in the province of Diyarbakir, 12-year-old Gülay Uslu tells a campaign volunteer a common story: “My father took me out of school last year. My parents are finding it hard to make ends meet. They need help, and it was difficult for me to help them out and study at the same time. I didn’t want to leave school, but I had no choice.”

In south-eastern Turkey, where Gülay is from, poverty and cultural traditions have kept girls at home. More value is often placed on what a girl can do for her family today than on nurturing her potential.

“Although I was sad to leave school, I didn’t think that it was going to cause problems in my future,” says Gülay. “I was thinking that I will soon be married like my elder sister and that I will have a family of my own, God willing.”

The campaign volunteer explains to Gülay and her mother, Hatice, that education is the best possible solution to the poverty and hardship that Gülay and her family face daily: “She can find a better paid job for a start. She will be better able to look after herself, and you and your husband in your old age.”

The campaign has proved to be a big step forward for both the Turkish government and the nation as a whole. In its first year in 2003, the campaign focused on 10 south-eastern provinces with the lowest enrolment rates for girls.

In 2004, the campaign expanded to another 23 provinces, including the major urban centres of Ankara, Istanbul and Izmir. In 2005, the campaign expanded to a further 20 provinces, bringing the total to 53 out of Turkey’s 81 provinces.

For some girls there is a happy ending to the story. Gülay has re-enrolled in school. The volunteer who visited Gülay’s home was able to clinch her argument by showing Hatice how to claim the monthly payment of the Conditional Cash Transfer, which helps offset the expense of sending children like her daughter to school. This incentive, encouraged by UNICEF and financially supported by the World Bank, is provided by the government's Social Security Fund.

Money for expenses may have helped win the argument. But the fact that Gülay is in school may also be a sign of the growing consensus that education is imperative for every child.

As Zozan Ozgokce, a volunteer in Van – an eastern province where up to one third of girls are out of school – put it: “When we ask women how they want their children to live, they almost never say, ‘like me.’ And when we ask the women what they want to be, they say, ‘educated.’”

Note: Some country-specific information was provided by UNICEF country offices or drawn from UNICEF country office annual reports.

Achieve universal primary education and promote gender equality and empowerment of women(MDG 2, 3)

‘Let’s Go to School, Girls!’

Local efforts

Achieve universal primary education and promote gender equality and empowerment of women
(MDG 2, 3)