Dubai Cares wants more children in Yemen schools

Sana'a: In the winding streets of the Old City of Sana'a a loud chorus of children's voices can be heard from behind the closed gates of a large building.

Just as in schools all over the country, students repeat after their teacher in unison, while outside, others run around in the gravelly playground that serves as a sports area. In two shifts every day, around 2,000 primary school students - boys and girls - are taught in just over 20 classrooms, some four children to a desk.

Built only two years ago, this is a relatively new school, where around 65 Year Two students cram into one classroom, peering up at their teacher as she goes through an Arabic lesson. "This is a good average of students per classroom," the teacher says unfazed.

Thousands of kilometres away in the UAE, the Dubai Cares campaign has come to an end, but the massive Dh1.72 billion in funds raised are now being allocated. At least Dh1 million has so far been pledged for the work of the United Nations Children's Fund (Unicef) in Yemen by the education initiative, launched on September 19 by His Highness Shaikh Mohammad Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice-President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai.

So, why was Yemen among the first countries to receive support from the campaign to educate 1 million children? While recent advances have been said to be "tremendous", Unicef Yemen's Chief of Basic Education and Gender Equity Lieke van de Wiel told Gulf News the country's education system still faces many challenges.

According to Yemen's Ministry of Education, there is now around 75 per cent enrolment in basic education in the country, but only 62 per cent of girls are part of the education system.

But, with the numbers rising, existing schools are increasingly overcrowded.

"The government has to invest a great deal because of the increase in the number of children enrolled in schools. An estimated 760,000 extra children a year have to be accommodated into the education system," van de Wiel said.

Enrolment in Yemen's rural areas is significantly lower than in the cities, according to Unicef, and there is a lack of teachers, especially females, in smaller towns and villages.

The Dubai Cares funds earmarked for Unicef Yemen will most likely go towards the organisation's child friendly schools, which strive to promote "healthy and protective environments for learning," as well as quality education. School kits, including notebooks, pens and pencils, will also be distributed through the funds.

"The child friendly school approach is about getting communities involved," van de Wiel explained. "For example here, more awareness is needed about the importance of keeping girls in school and we have developed guidelines in cooperation with the government and communities."

Dubai Cares' pledge looks set to support the programmes' pilot project, where selected schools will receive a grant they will be able to spend in line with their needs. However, some issues cannot be solved just through funding, van de Wiel said.

"Changing certain mindsets is also important, along with the tremendous challenge of growing with the needs of the country, while meeting the enormous infrastructural challenges."

This is something that Bader Mosleh, 31, an English teacher in a Sana'a public primary school, is all too familiar with. He teaches up to 130 children in one class, some of whom sit in the windowsills because of the lack of space.

"There are so many children in each class, but at the same time many schools do not have computer labs and others don't even have teachers for some specialised subjects," he told Gulf News.

Ameen Al Edreesi, 33, a teacher in a Sana'a secondary school, says some students are also faced with the choice between work and school. "Some children are not even in school, because they have to help their families. Children as young as 10 drop out of school because of poverty," he told Gulf News. "Then there are those children who have to work after school."

Both teachers say that while many government schools are in need of laboratories, classrooms, libraries, teaching aids and even chairs, the sheer numbers of children in each class is overwhelming.

"When it comes to teaching, the biggest problem is trying to make the children learn and understand. Not just crowd control, but trying to actually teach them," Mosleh said.

However, despite the many challenges, van de Wiel contends the outlook is not all bleak. "What [the country] has so far managed to do is very impressive and it is especially important to know that a country in the region like the UAE wants to support children in Yemen," she told Gulf News.

"The challenge now is to keep focused to getting that remaining 25 per cent of children into school."