Ensuring Education for All: Non-schooling, early drop out and high absenteeism in Sri Lanka

Chandra Gunawardena
Open University of Sri Lankaa

Swarna Jayaweera
Centre for Women's Research

     Full text: HTML
     Last modified: October 16, 2006
     Presentation date: 11/02/2006 2:30 PM in NT Portland A
     (View Schedule)

Abstract
The paper presents the findings of a study on the incidence of non-school going in households and the factors leading to non-schooling or early school leaving.

There were more children in school than out of school with little gender difference. More than forty % of the out of school children had dropped out early. More girls than boys had never been to school and more boys than girls were dropouts. More out of school children were in 10-14 age group. The percentage of out of school children was higher among Tamil children. Almost 10 % had been absent through the two weeks of the survey and 44.5% had been absent for more than 5 of the 10 school days.

The major factors of non-schooling, dropout and high absenteeism were (1) socio-economic (poverty, indifference of parents, unstable family environments), (2) school related (refusal to admit poor children, or those without birth certificates, lack of facilities for children with disabilities, harsh punishments) and (3) personal (chronic ill-health, disability, and learning difficulties). The findings indicated that multi-pronged strategies are necessary to ensure to all children the right to education.