At a glance: Morocco

Real lives

A recipe for educating girls in Morocco

© UNICEF Morocco/2003

A primary school girl eyes her work carefully.

Aïcha is an 11-year-old girl living in Morocco who has done something no other girl or woman in her family has accomplished. She is the first female member in her family to attend school. She is in the fourth grade. 

Her sister Meryem, at 16, is one of the 60 per cent of girls in Morocco who, a decade ago, could not have imagined entering school.

Times are changing for Aïcha. Having enrolled at the age of seven, she is doing very well and has successfully passed every grade. Despite the expense of sending their daughter to school here in Morroco, Aïcha’s family has decided that illiteracy for their child would be far more costly. 

It takes community to keep girls in classrooms 

Aïcha goes to a school that was built in her village. The year she entered school, the community, with UNICEF assistance, installed village water sources. Having water closer to homes meant that women and girls spent less time carrying it. A young female facilitator of women’s literacy classes also encouraged the installation and use of modern household stoves, reducing the time spent collecting wood, and thus providing more time for classwork.

The school director helped Aïcha’s enrollment, accepting her into the school even though she did not have a birth certificate. He also helped her parents to get all their children officially registered.

The school provides meals through another government programme. At first the community distributed sandwiches in the dusty school yard. Later, it gave out more substantial meals. As a result, Aïcha’s stomach no longer rumbles and she remains alert and attentive in class.

Dreams and determination

Other factors threaten Aïcha’s education in spite of the child-friendly environment created in school. This year, the long-awaited rain fell to turn parched land into luscious fields of green. Lucky for Morocco. Worrisome for Aïcha.

Abundant fields mean that all family members need to help by working the land, caring for the house and minding the younger children. She has already seen many of her friends absent from class.

Aïcha may face many obstacles but she is determined to finish school, even if it means getting up earlier to help with daily chores. She wants a better life than her mother and elder sister who work from dawn to dusk. In Morocco, the legal age for a girl to marry is 15, but school has shown her a different way. Aïcha wants to delay marriage and become a teacher.

The primary school has given her much more than dreams. The reality is that her life, and the life of the community, has been enriched by coming together to make literacy and numeracy possible for girls and boys. By offering health services and adult literacy classes, the students and their parents are receiving the support they need for the future.

The teacher, trained in health care by UNICEF and the Moroccan health and education ministries, monitors the children’s hygiene, watches out for symptoms of illness and encourages parents to take their children to the health centre located about 20 kilometres away.

Aïcha has a long road to travel if she is to fulfil her dream of becoming a teacher, but she is not making the trip alone. Her family and community helped pave the way by joining the Moroccan Government, UNICEF and its other partners to build a learning environment for girls and boys.

The formula was simple: Erect a safe, clean building. Add education, water, sanitation and health care. Then top it off with children.