2016 Annual Conference

The legacy of colonial education lingers on even fifty years after independence of many African countries as is the case of Burkina Faso. Though African governments have struggled to maintain respectable levels of investment in education even with the economic recession and structural adjustment problems, there is the continuing persistent inequality between the sexes in educational attainment despite increased access of educational opportunities for women over the last four decades.

General audience but more particularly for those in pursuit of knowledge on Third World development, gender and adult literacy notably in African countries.

It is the contention of this paper that many of the schools started by missionaries in African countries were not only separate but also unequal in both the type and quality of education administered to the girls. Girls were streamlined into schools that targets girls where goals of education were limited to domestic training and community development and less on the critical disciplines. In many countries, a relatively high percentage of high school women graduates (in Burkina Faso, it is women with the baccalaureate) and those with Bachelors degree are found in teacher training and nursing programs in keeping with the rest of the world notably the United States of America. Many others with respectable levels of education (two years of high school) end up with jobs in food service, dressmaking, hair dressing and small scale commerce. Men on the other hand, were encouraged to take on more challenging subjects in science and technology, business and economics and thus, their prospects in the job market and career mobility patterns were enhanced. Research today shows that modest attempts have been made to rectify the past discrepancies but women and girls are still enrolled in a limited number of fields of study that have less access to and participation in technical and scientific areas. This is not unique to Africa.