| Short Summary | | Title | Gender Sensitive Educational Policy and Practice: the Case of Malawi | | Author | Maluwa-Banda, D. | | Publication Date | January 2003 | | Publisher | Zomba University | | Summary | What progress has been made towards ensuring that education in Malawi is gender sensitive? This paper provides an update on the Malawian Ministry of Education, Science and Technology's Policy and Investment Framework (PIF) and Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper (PRSP), which emphasise the need to address gender imbalances and inequity in the education system at all levels. The main challenge has been translating the gender sensitive policies into practice, for example in the implementation of the curricula. There is also a need to ensure that improvements in levels of attendance for girls and boys in primary education are reflected in secondary school and higher education attendance figures. Another issue is that even when girls do attend higher education they are generally confined to “caring” fields like teaching and nursing, or to arts subjects like history. Positive steps forward may include carrying out a gender sensitive review of the educational curricula, and removing the barriers girls face to studying certain subjects such as science. Other recommendations include reducing class sizes, providing more and better teaching materials and ensuring teachers receive high quality, gender sensitive training.
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