Education of Disadvantaged Children in OIC:
The Key to Escape from Poverty
160
Location/Area of residence: Access and completion rates are higher in urban settings than rural
ones. In 2012, urban attendance rates for 6-11 year olds and 12-15 year olds were respectively
16 and 20 percentage points higher than rural attendance rates for the same age groups.
However, the urban/rural divide has improved over time. Across all indicators, the percentage
point difference between rural and urban rates decreased between 1990 and 2012. Rural
attendance rates for primary and secondary-aged children are higher than rural completion rates
for 5 years and 8 years of schooling. The latter stands at just 37% while the rural primary
completion rate is 57%. This means that almost 2 out of every 3 rural students from the older cohort
does not manage to complete 8 years of schooling.
Location/Regions: There are wide regional differences in terms of attendance and completion
rates at primary and secondary levels.
In 2012, for both the 6-11 and 12-15 age cohorts, attendance rates are highest in Punjab, followed
by Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Sindh and Balochistan. Punjab’s first place is significant since it is by far
the most populous region. Unsurprisingly, the poorest region, and most sparsely populated
Balochistan has the lowest access rates, with attendance rates for 6-11 and 12-15 years at 52%
and 49% respectively and completion rates for 5 years and 8 years as low as 34% and 31%. This
means that in Balochistan, 2 out of 3 children do not complete 5 years of schooling and almost half
of the relevant age group do not attend primary or secondary school.
Across all indicators, the region that has made most progress between 1990 and 2012 is the
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa region. Worryingly, Sindh did not progress much in terms of access and
completion rates of the 12-15 age cohort.
Poverty: In terms of attendance rates for 6-11 year olds, all socio-economic categories
experienced an improvement between 1990 and 2012, even the lowest/poor quintile which
increased from 28% in 1990 to 45.3% in 2012. This remains a low access rate as it means that
over half of the poorest children aged 6-11 are not attending school in 2012. The correlation
between all indicators and poverty is very strong.
The 1990-2012 improvements experienced by 6-11 year old poor students are not present for
other categories and indicators, which increased by only a few percentage points over the 22 year
period, and have even worsened for the attendance of 12-15 year olds in the lowest wealth
quintile.
Another worrying trend is that the divide (percentage difference) between the richest and poorest
quintile has increased for all indicators except the primary attendance rate. Therefore, progress
for the richest quintile has been steeper than progress for the poorest quintile, further
exacerbating the divide between rich and poor in terms of access to schooling.