RECOMMENDATIONS
OF THE ELMINA CONFERENCE ON HIV/AIDS AND
EDUCATION:
A CALL FOR ACTION
Elmina,
Ghana, 19-23 march 2001
"The
threat posed by HIV/AIDS to the achievements
of EFA goals and to development more
broadly, especially in sub-Saharan Africa,
present an enormous challenge. The terrifying
impact of HIV/AIDS on education demands,
supply and quality requires explicit and
immediate attention in national policy-making
and planning. Programmes to control and
reduce the threat of the virus must make
maximum use of education's potential to
transmit messages on prevention and to change
attitudes and behaviours."
World
Education Forum, The Dakar Framework for
Action, para 27, p.14
Senior
experts from the ministries of education
and from other ministries, such as health,
coming from 13 ECOWAS nations and other
countries from Eastern and Southern Africa,
from universities, from social partners
in education, non-governmental organisations,
from UN system organisations at headquarters,
regional and national levels, as well as
from most major international cooperation
agencies, met in Elmina 19-23 March 2001.
We
met to consider how educators are responding
to the impact of HIV/AIDS on education in
West Africa, where access and equity, quality
and relevance, capacity building and partnerships
and our ability to provide education services
appropriate to national development are
under threat.
We
considered the current and potential impact
of the disease on all education subsectors
- from early childhood to higher education.
We are convinced that, in counterattacking
AIDS, ministries of education can - and
must - work in close partnership with all
ministries and in particular the Ministry
of health, parents, students, teachers,
the media, non-governmental organizations
(NGOs), teacher trade unions, faith-based
and community-based organisations.
We
reviewed evidence in our own countries,
communities and learning institutions of
the inexorable spread of HIV/AIDS, and the
clear indications that our education systems
are already under attack throughout West
Africa. We believe that we must be proactive
now as a matter of utmost urgency, to protect
both the lives and wellbeing of our people,
our potential for development and the rich
cultural heritage of our region.
While
West Africa is still relatively less affected
than East and Southern Africa, prevalence
rates in some countries are creeping up.
Increasing mobility of populations and conflict
situations will continue to exacerbate the
region's already tenuous position regarding
HIV/AIDS. Cote d'Ivoire is already among
the 15 worst affected countries in the world
(prevalence rate: 10.76%), prevalence rate
in Burkina Faso is 6.44% and Togo 5.98%.
In Nigeria over 5% of adults are infected
with the HIV virus or more than 2.7 million
people (Report on the Global HIV/AIDS epidemic
for 2000, UNAIDS ).
LEADERSHIP
COMMITMENT
We
urge ECOWAS education ministers to fulfil
the national and international commitments
they have already made to prevent the spread
of AIDS, and to protect the health of our
children and of the education system itself.
These include the need, identified in Addis
Ababa, for Heads of States and national
decision-makers to lead the fight personally.
These also include commitments made recently
at the Sub-Saharan Conference on Education
For All (Johannesburg, December 1999), in
the Dakar Framework for Action (World Education
Forum, Dakar, April 2000), the Africa Development
Forum (Addis Ababa, December 2000), as well
as those made in national HIV strategies
and international debt-reduction agreements
and a host of other agreements made earlier
in the past decade.
We
recognize that ultimate responsibility for
information and services for AIDS and education
is national, and that our main efforts must
be concentrated within countries. At the
same time, we believe that practical possibilities
exist for working cooperatively on a regional
basis, in order to move decisively against
the epidemic.
In
this context, while we recognize that all
ECOWAS educational systems must sustain
their national education goals and reform
efforts, the participants, taking account
of international and national strategies,
experience elsewhere in Africa and conditions
in our own region, identified the following
3 strategic lines of action for education
sectors in ECOWAS countries.
(1) Preventing and controlling the spread
of HIV/AIDS: especially among young people
in and out of school, college and universities,
and among educators.
(2) Reducing the traumatic impact of HIV/AIDS
on learners, educators and the education
system itself.
(3)
Improving our management capacity and procedures
to ensure that effective action can be taken
to respond to this crisis.
PREVENTING
AND CONTROLLING THE SPREAD OF HIV/AIDS
It must be ensured that:
1. Life skills curricula (including HIV/AIDS
issues appropriate to each age group) are
in place in all learning institutions and
that they are made examinable.
2. Learner-friendly and gender sensitive
life skills materials are developed and
distributed, and are used.
3. Young people are full participants in
the response through peer education and
other child-to-child or youth-to-youth activities.
4. Teachers, teacher educators, school counsellors,
and managers receive pre-service and in-service
education and training on HIV/AIDS issues.
5. Information, education and communication
(IEC) campaigns on HIV/AIDS are implemented
to reach young people in and out of school.
6. Youth-friendly health education and counselling
services are available locally which address
problems related to HIV/AIDS, STDs and reproductive
health.
7. A range of partners are included in the
education system's prevention work (including
parents, persons living with HIV/AIDS, religious
and traditional leaders, the media, local
community groups, local and other NGOs,
the private sector). Volunteer AIDS patients
should be closely associated to this process.
PROTECTING LEARNERS, EDUCATORS AND EDUCATION
QUALITY
It
must be ensured that:
8. Care and support programmes for orphans
and vulnerable children are in place.
9. HIV support programmes are in place including:
· counselling and care for learners affected
by HIV/AIDS in all learning institutions.
· counselling and support for educators
helping learners to cope with HIV/AIDS.
10.
Innovations in education delivery and outreach
are identified which take account of complex
and changing learning needs (including outreach
brigades, peer education, youth clubs, and
media campaigns).
11.
Workplace policy and guidelines on HIV/AIDS
are in place in all learning institutions
and ministry of education offices (including
employee benefits for educators affected
by AIDS).
12.
Assessment of the impact of HIV/AIDS on
the education sector has been done, and
action plans are being implemented to stabilise
demand for and supply of education, and
protect its quality. Such assessment should
be regularly updated.
MANAGING
THE HIV/AIDS CRISIS IN THE EDUCATION SECTOR
It must be ensured that:
13. At the national level, the Ministry
of Education is involved in the UN Theme
Group on AIDS.
14. Where absent, a unit in each country
with responsibility for HIV/AIDS (and if
necessary, related health issues) and education
is established, staffed at senior levels
and provided with adequate resources to
drive HIV/AIDS and education strategies,
nationally and at decentralized levels.
15.
Substantial resources for the fight against
HIV/AIDS are mobilised, allocated and used
effectively.
16.
Information and data on the pandemic is
systematically collected, stored, disseminated
and used, within a coherent and comprehensive
national and regional research agenda for
HIV and education which should be implemented
by specialized institutions within the Sub-region.
17. The capacity of managers and planners
at all levels to understand and cope with
HIV-related difficulties of students and
teachers is strengthened.
18.
Intersectoral and sectoral management procedures
and structures within the education sectors
exist and are implemented in collaboration
with the health sector. These should be
flexible, coordinated and able to cope with
the demands of the pandemic.
19.
Policies relating to HIV/AIDS and education
issues are reviewed, revised, in place,
and rigorously applied (including educator
rights and responsibilities, discrimination
in learning institutions, sexual harassment,
safety and human rights).
20.
Mechanisms are in place for ongoing monitoring
and evaluation of the performance of the
education sector in fighting HIV/AIDS, with
agreed benchmarks and indicators of progress.
REGIONAL ACTION
We are convinced that practical possibilities
exist for working cooperatively within the
region.
In
the same way that the education sector's
response to the epidemic is set within a
larger context of each National Strategic
Plan on HIV/AIDS, so a country's planning
has a regional context. Each ECOWAS nation
is affected by the problems and issues of
its neighbors, and is linked to them socially,
economically and epidemiologically. To respond
effectively to HIV/AIDS, every country should
take into account its geographic location
and recognize the problems and opportunities
linked to regional relationships.
The
key opportunities include:
· The creation of regional frameworks for
cooperation in order to share data, best
practices, and other insights into planned
responses. These could take the form of
agreements, protocols, associations and
any other means to assure both cooperation
and access to information.
·
The establishment or reinforcement of regional
assets include institutes (e.g., to research
and develop generic resources such as training
and educational materials for country adoption),
task teams (to provide a combined regional
competence and body of knowledge available
to all), training (to provide training of
trainers) and cost-effectiveness by creating
regional economies of scale.
· a lobby for regional and country needs
and concerns.
· a regional forum for advocacy
· the expansion of expert networks, including
linking institutions of learning to support
and supplement country capacity.
At the regional level, the West African
Health Organization, which is a part of
ECOWAS, should cooperate more closely with
UNAIDS and the concerned UN Agencies in
HIV/AIDS and education activities.
Finally, the participants expressed thanks
to UNESCO for taking the initiative of organizing
the Elmina Conference and to donors for
supporting this activity. They finally insisted
that the organisers ensure that the proper
follow-up be given to this important meeting.
SENIOR
EXPERTS CONFERENCE ON HIV/AIDS AND EDUCATION
IN ECOWAS. ELMINA, GHANA, 19-23 MARCH 2001
