 Rural kids short-changedIn Burkina Faso, 75% of primary school age children in urban areas attend school, but in rural areas only 26% do. The 49 percentage point gap is the greatest among 41 countries surveyed during the period 1990-1995; in Mali, Morocco, Niger and Senegal the gaps exceed 30 percentage points. Nearly two thirds of the countries surveyed have urban/rural gaps of at least 10 percentage points or more. In only 3 of the 41 countries—Bangladesh, Kenya and Namibia—are attendance rates in rural areas slightly higher than in urban areas.The surveys also measured disparities between boys’ and girls’ school attendance and found that these were not as great as those between urban and rural attendance. In only 2 of the 41 countries—Yemen and Nepal—were gender disparities greater than urban-rural differences. In Yemen, the attendance rate for girls is 34 percentage points lower than for boys. In Nepal, it is 20 percentage points lower. Disparities between regions within countries are also often significant.
In India, the rate of primary school attendance in Kerala is 95%, while
in Bihar it is 51%. The rate in Lower Egypt is 89%, but drops to 69% in
Upper Egypt.
Disparity in urban and rural attendance |