To respond to the Do Now, you can comment below or tweet your response. Be sure to begin your tweet with @KQEDEdspace and end it with #DoNowMalala
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Why is it important for boys and girls to receive equal opportunities in education? What societal problems can be caused by an inequality in educational opportunities? Do you think there is inequality in educational opportunities in America? If so, what do they look like?
In many places around the world, boys and girls receive different and unequal opportunities to pursue an education. The inequality of opportunity typically has major consequences for these societies, and the individual women and men who live in them.
Research shows that educating girls has a ripple effect on their families and societies. The World Bank reports that for every extra year of education, girls’ wages can increase 20 percent. Education also helps to lower rates of child marriage and reduce birth rates, both of which have lasting positive impacts on girls’ lives.
Last year, 14-year-old Pakistani student Malala Yousafzai was targeted and shot by radical Taliban militants while on her school bus. Malala was a youth blogger for the BBC advocating girls education in her native Pakistan, and continued to go to school despite a Taliban ban outlawing women’s education.
Malala made a full recovery, and has since used her newfound fame to highlight the discrimination that girls often face when seeking an education in the developing world, and why girls’ education is so essential to the health of a society.
People of color and women have faced similar discrimination getting an education in the United States. A major cornerstone of the civil rights movement was desegregating schools in order to make sure white and black students were receiving the same opportunities for success.
In the United States today, all children have the right to a public education, but inequities in schooling still exist. What does education and inequality look like where you live?
PBS NewsHour video Malala says assassination threats can’t weaken her cause
Malala Yousafzai, a Pakistani schoolgirl, became well-known in 2009 when she wrote a series of published diary articles about the right to education, especially for girls. Last October, in the Swat Valley region of Pakistan, a Taliban gunman shot Yousafzai in the head and neck while she was riding a school bus. But the assassination attempt failed, and since then she has not stopped her campaign for all children to attend school. Despite new threats on her life by the Taliban, Yousafzai is not deterred. “Now I’m living a second life. And God has given me this new life for the cause of education,” Yousafzai said to NewsHour chief foreign correspondent Margaret Warner in an interview Friday.
To respond to the Do Now, you can comment below or tweet your response. Be sure to begin your tweet with @KQEDedspace and end it with #DoNowMalala
For more info on how to use Twitter, click here.
We encourage students to reply to other people’s tweets to foster more of a conversation. Also, if students tweet their personal opinions, ask them to support their ideas with links to interesting/credible articles online (adding a nice research component) or retweet other people’s ideas that they agree/disagree/find amusing. We also value student-produced media linked to their tweets like memes or more extensive blog posts to represent their ideas. Of course, do as you can… and any contribution is most welcomed.
The Malala Fund video I Am Malala (Official Music Video)
The Malala Fund is the official organization led by Malala Yousafzai focused on helping girls go to school and raise their voices for the right to education. This song and video is NOT politically motivated or meant to take sides with any given country or ideology. It is not meant to support US policy nor was the US government involved in any way in its creation. It is in support of Pakistan and education throughout the world. Specifically, it is simply young artists coming together from around the world with a positive message of education and peace for all.
PBS NewsHour Extra article 8 Top Resources for Teaching Girls’ Empowerment in The Developing World
October 11 is International Day of the Girl, and the PBS NewsHour is celebrating by interviewing Malala Yousafzai, a courageous young advocate for girls’ education from Pakistan’s Swat Valley. Religious extremists in her homeland use violent tactics to prevent girls from going to school. Last year, Malala was shot in the head when men boarded her school bus and asked for her by name. She recovered and is now a worldwide symbol for girls’ empowerment through education.
NPR radio segment Malala Yousafzai: A ‘Normal,’ Yet Powerful Girl
“I think Malala is an average girl,” Ziauddin Yousafzai says about the 16-year-old Pakistani girl who captured the world’s attention after being shot by the Taliban, “but there’s something extraordinary about her.”
KQED Do Now is produced in collaboration with PBS NewsHour Extra. This post was written by Allison McCartney of PBS NewsHour Extra.