A study on children with disabilities and their right to education: Madagascar
Every single child has the right to education
Highlights
Despite the efforts and achievements of Education for All (EFA) and the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), it is recognized that children with disabilities remain one of the main groups around the world that continue to be excluded from education, and those that attend school are more likely to be excluded in the classroom and to drop out (UNESCO, 2015). This study was commissioned by UNICEF East and Southern Africa Regional Office together with CfBT Education Trust (now Education Development Trust), and forms part of a broader regional study on the right to education of children with disabilities. It is one of a series of three case studies conducted in Madagascar, Comoros and Rwanda in the early part of 2015.
The Malagasy Constitution stipulates that every child has the right to free primary education, and this is reflected in the government commitment to achieve the international Education for All (EFA) targets. While Madagascar made significant progress towards achieving EFA over the past decade, the country has been significantly impacted since 2009 by a period of political unrest which resulted in falling financial support from donors. If the situation has now normalized, about 90 per cent of the population lives nowadays on less than USD 2 a day, and the financial cost of schooling to be borne by households hence represents one of the main barriers to enrolment in school. The net enrolment rate at primary level decreased from 96.8 per cent in 2005 to 69.4 per cent in 2012, with an estimated 1.5 million children of primary school age currently out of school.
