system in equal numbers. Ghana has had a law on compulsory primary education since 1961, but the evidence shows how elusive gender equality can be in practice. Eve is being disadvantaged early in her youth.
The tertiary or higher level of education, where technical and professional credentials are earned, is where African women are least well represented. In all regions of the world except South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa, there are at least 60 female students for every 100 male students in higher education. In South Asia, women drop to 44 per hundred men, and in Sub-Saharan Africa there are only one third as many women students as men. In comparison, male and female ratios in higher education are virtually equal in Latin America and the Caribbean, Europe and North America.11
The percentage of the population entering tertiary education in Ghana decreased slightly from the beginning of the 1980s to the end of that decade. Gross enrolment levels for men were only 2.3 per cent in 1988, and for women only 0.6 per cent. Analysis of the subject areas chosen by those in higher education showed only two per cent of all students were enrolled in education courses in 1988, of which a negligible percentage were women.12 If we consider for a moment the projected need for teachers even to meet the goal of primary education for all referred to above, we are clearly heading for trouble. And the special need for female teachers to help improve the educational attainment of girls is even further from being met. A true national emergency exists in this field which requires urgent attention.
We know that education increases women's self-esteem and confidence, and encourages a sense of control over personal destiny. Studies show that women who have a similar level of education to their husbands are in a much better negotiating position in family decision-making areas and are more likely to stand up for themselves. Educated women are also more likely to use contraception to limit the size of their families at their desired level, and are more likely to have children survive into adulthood. Data from 33 less-developed countries show that every additional year of mother's schooling is associated with a seven to nine per cent drop in child mortality.13 In all these ways, education is a necessary tool for delivering women from the sorrows of perpetual childbearing and breaking the bonds to free women from their subordination.
In the World Declaration on Education for All, adopted in Thailand in 1990, countries agreed to give female education increased attention, stating that: "The most urgent priority is to ensure access to, and improve the quality of, education for girls and women, and to remove every obstacle that hampers their active participation".14 I have referred to some of the obstacles and the solutions needed to address the gender gap in education - such as recruiting and training more female teachers, establishing more community-based (less distant) schools and providing greater privacy and safety for girls. Experiments with flexibility in the hours, days and seasons of classes have also proven successful for example, late afternoon or evening classes in India and Kenya are attended by many adolescent girls who have spent a full day on household and productive tasks.15 The success of non-formal primary education programmes such as that organized by the Bangladesh Rural Advancement Committee in attracting girls from poor families shows that adapting the learning opportunities to the circumstances of poverty and the disadvantage of children is a far more pragmatic approach than requiring children to adjust to the conventional rules of primary school.16 Waiving fees or providing scholarships for girls may also be necessary, particularly at the secondary- school level: a project in rural Zimbabwe has shown that no family approached with an offer to support a daughter through secondary school has turned down this support, and all are more enthusiastic about their daughters' futures as a result.17
Making the school curriculum more appealin