IAUP Executive Board Meeting - July 12-16, 2006 - Vienna, Austria

“Women’s empowerment and their full participation on the basis of equality in all spheres of society, including participation in the decision-making process and access to power, are fundamental for the achievement of equality, development and peace.”  

---Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action

  “The world is also starting to grasp that there is no policy for progress more effective than the empowerment of women and girls. Study after study has taught us that no other policy is as likely to raise economic productivity, or to reduce infant and maternal mortality. No other policy is as sure to improve nutrition and promote health—including the prevention of HIV/AIDS. No other policy is as powerful in increasing the chances for education for the next generation. And I would also venture that no policy is more important in preventing conflict, or in achieving reconciliation after a conflict has ended.”

---UN Secretary - General Kofi Annan

PROPOSAL

We posit that it is a timely initiative for IAUP to set up a Commission on Women’s Education for the purpose of equipping the IAUP to actively contribute to the cause of gender equality and women empowerment, as urged by the UN Commission on the Status of Women.  The IAUP would do well to mainstream gender into every dimension of its work, as the noble task of education calls for equal development of both women and men without discrimination.

IAUP has a strategic role to play in influencing the policies and practices of universities worldwide towards the development of gender equality so that both men and women can take their rightful places in society. s of subordination, human rights, equity, justice and social change.

RATIONALE

Allow me to share with you some concepts that interface with our roles as educators—as university presidents and leaders of the academe.

At the 2005 World Summit, the Outcome Document declared that: “progress for women is progress for all”.  Human Rights are Women’s Rights.

Of first concern are the issues that confront education and training of women as stipulated in the 1995 Beijing Platform for Action:

1) Equal access to education

2) Eradication of illiteracy among women

3) Non-discriminatory education and training

4) Adequate resources for education and training

5) Access to vocational training, science and technology, and continuing education

6) Lifelong education and training for girls and women

7) Leadership, professional growth and career advancement

8) Gender education, women’s empowerment and gender mainstreaming

    for social transformation

The UN Commission on the Status of Women, in its Fiftieth session (27 February – 10 March 2006) urged Governments, and as appropriate, the United Nations system, the international financial institutions, other international and regional organizations, civil society, including the private sector, non-governmental institutions and academic institutions, and other relevant stakeholders, to take the following actions.

In the area of Education:

a)    Require all educational institutions to put in place policies aimed at preventing violence and harassment of girls and women, which include complaints mechanisms, and monitor the effectiveness of such policies;

b)    Provide training for teachers on gender stereotypes, and work with communities to address the underlying causes of inequality and discrimination;

c)    Eliminate gender bias in curricula, methodologies and teaching practice that perpetuate gender inequalities and develop specific curricula and materials on gender equality for both boys and girls at all levels of education;

d)    Increase the access of girls and women to education and training on science and technology, including on ICT

[Source: Commission on the Status of Women, Fiftieth session
27 February–10 March 2006 Draft Agreed Conclusions, pp. 3-4.]

In the area of Decision-making processes:

The Commission on the Status of Women reaffirmed the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action on women in power and decision-making, which emphasized that, without the active participation of women and the incorporation of women’s perspective at all levels of decision-making, the goals of equality, development and peace cannot be achieved, and that women’s equal participation is a necessary condition for women’s interests to be taken into account and is needed in order to strengthen democracy and promote its proper functioning;

The Commission recognized that efforts are needed by all stakeholders to create an enabling environment for de facto gender equality in decision-making.

Following are actions urged by the Commission that are of specific relevance to academia:

d)    Ensure women’s equal access to employment opportunities, productive resources, information and education and training, including leadership training, in order to facilitate their full and equal participation in decision-making processes at all levels;

f)    Facilitate networking among women in decision-making positions at all levels including in academia, trade unions, the media and civil society organizations;

g)    Encourage men in decision-making positions to promote gender equality and empowerment of women and support women’s participation and leadership in decision-making processes at all levels;

h)    Promote efforts to eliminate stereotypes, including in education and training programmes and in the media, and encourage the portrayal of positive images of women as leaders in all areas of life;

j)    Facilitate research on the conditions under which the influence of women in decision-making positions or policy outcomes is increased, and women’s leadership at all levels is enhanced, and disseminate lessons learned and good practices;

v)    Promote recruitment and career-development programmes that equip women with managerial, entrepreneurial and technical skills to enable them to assume decision-making positions at all levels and areas, especially in economic decision-making;

y)    Strengthen research, monitoring and evaluation of progress in the participation of women in decision-making processes at all levels, including the local level, in particular in areas where there is a dearth of information, such as the economy, academia, media, trade unions, including through the development of standardized methodology for systematic collection of gender-specific data and statistics disaggregated by sex.

[Source: Commission on the Status of Women, Fiftieth session 27 February – 10 March 2006 Draft Agreed Conclusions: Equal participation of women and men in decision-making processes at all levels, pp. 3-4.]

AN ADVOCACY ROLE FOR THE IAUP

The proposed Commission on Women’s Education could look into facets of women’s education as well as universities for women, including women’s studies in the different colleges and universities around the world, especially those we represent in IAUP. 

The primary role of the IAUP Commission on Women’s Education is one of advocacy.  The major objectives are the following:

a)   To advocate for women’s education worldwide

b)   To share best practices in women’s education and global leadership

c)   To foster institutional exchange among faculty and students in various women institutions, colleges and universities as well as those that offer women’s studies and gender education

d)   To develop and organize international conferences and seminars

Educational Institutions can play a leading and proactive role towards gender equity:

• Promote gender-fair language

• Conduct “Gender Audit” in our respective institutions

• Review curricula to ensure that content materials and teaching strategies do not reinforce gender bias nor gender tracking in our schools.

• Integrate gender fair policies

• Use HERSTORY to make women visible in historical documentation and in the development process

• Develop Women’s studies courses, programs and research

• Build networks with other academic institutions, government agencies, business and industry; Join the Women Leaders’ Network

Academic institutions, particularly women’s universities, “act as a catalyst to bring attitudinal changes among men and women towards the goal of gender mainstreaming”.

The goal of gender mainstreaming is gender equality. The mainstreaming strategy can ensure that the gender equality objective influences other policy areas (i.e., poverty alleviation, food security, social reform, resource allocation, etc.).

Empowerment of women is a prerequisite to gender equality. Empowering and gender equity measures for women mean building women’s capacities and responding to strategic interests and practical needs of women, particularly those in poverty and extremely difficult situations. Women need to gain access to training, technology, credit, information and markets.

Educational institutions are challenged to take their rightful role in facilitating the empowerment process among women. This involves “a reorientation in the thinking on various educational processes and efforts, and the will to bring about the desired transformation in this vital area to maximize the human resource development for a better and more equitable society.”

VISION: CREATING A NETWORK OF UNIVERSITIES FOR WOMEN WORLDWIDE

In this first decade of the third millennium, women dare dream that the 21^st century might mean a significant rebirth and renewal in the role of women. Through the Universities, particularly through the Women Studies Programs, it is our hope to secure change in attitudes about gender, mainly by increasing understanding and awareness of gender differences and their implications for policy considerations.

We need to build linkages with other institutions, share best practices to strengthen our advocacy for women empowerment. We have to partner with industry to provide global competencies and on the job experience to enhance employability, advance professional and career development.

Over the past decades, the National Commission on the Role of Filipino Women (NCRFW), which is the Philippines national machinery for the advancement of women, has had active interaction with the academe, specifically the Women’s Studies Association of the Philippines (WSAP), the Philippine Women’s University (PWU) and its affiliate Development Institute for Women in Asia-Pacific (DIWA), University of the Philippines Center for Women’s Studies, TESDA Women’s Center, and Miriam College Gender and Development Institute.  Their common concern is the promotion of women’s leadership and advancement.

In January of this year, an international meeting of presidents and officials of women’s colleges/universities titled Women’s Education Worldwide 2006: Hopes and Dreams was held at Dubai Women’s College. The delegates discussed the role of education and developing effective collaboration towards promoting women as leaders in fields still dominated by men.  Group discussions centered on common issues and specific challenges in educating women. These include how we can ensure both access and quality as an educational institution, how we can sustain an educational mission that runs counter to the dominant trends in the higher education marketplace, how we can promote a balanced approach to work and family in women's lives, and how we can advocate effectively for the unfinished agenda of women's education and advancement. At this international forum, we sounded a call for networking and affiliation with other women’s colleges/universities, associations and alternative organizational strategies for WEW:

-       Possible tie-ups with Women’s Studies Programs for the substantive issues about women’s education, mainstreaming women’s concerns and women empowerment paradigms. 

-       Promoting HERSTORIES and organizing a global conference on HERSTORIES as a methodology to promote women’s education

B.  The Challenge

The multitude of gender issues in education and training has been the focus of gender and development policies and programs in the education sector.

We urge the IAUP to enhance its commitment to the development of human potential through education by ensuring gender mainstreaming for women's empowerment by providing gender fair education for women and men.  A first step is the setting up of an IAUP Commission on Women’s Education to play an active advocacy role.

Top