THE SITUATION OF WOMEN IN TURKEY

1
THE SITUATION OF EDUCATION of WOMEN in TURKEY

• Social Development and Gender Equality Center
• Mevlüde Sahillioglu

2
Social Development and Gender Equality Center
(SOGEP)is a newly established organization by a
group ofwomen activists and academicians
3
SOGEP mainly focuses onConducting research,
producing policy documents, tools and
kitsmonitoring and reporting
4
Content

• Statistics on Gender inequality in Turkey
• Education and women
• Obstacles
• Achivements
• Recommendations
• Conclusion

5
The current situation in political representation

• Women hold 9,1 of the seats in parliament
• The representation of women in local governments
  is below 1

6
(No Transcript)
7
Current situation in labor
8
Current Situation in labor according to education
level
9
Womens Entrepreneurship

• Only 12.5 of the entrepreneurs are women
• Only 0.9 of women in labour force are
  entrepreneurs

10
Current situation in labor

• Gender Pay Gap 22
• Womens participation in administrative
  positions 6
• Womens existence in professional and technical
  areas 30

11
(No Transcript)
12
Current situation in education

• Literacy rate women 81.1 , men 95.7
• 69 of women who live in rural areas and 81 of
  women who live in urban areas are literate
• In South-east Anatolia, 76,1 of the illiterate
  population is women and in this region, the
  illiteracy rate among women is 44,6
• Schooling in compulsary education boys is 92,
  girls are 86

13
Literacy

• 1/5 of the women in Turkey still do not know how
  to read and write
• In Southeast part, ½ of the women are illiterate
• Womens illiteracy has differences considering to
  urban, rural and regional layouts
• In Turkey, 20.91 of women are still illiterate
  compared to the 6.73 of men. The number of
  illiterate women is 5.5 million, and 1 million of
  them are living in South-East Anatolia, where 40
  of women are illiterate.

14
WHY?

• The major reason for such a high percentage of
  illiteracy of women in Turkey is the reluctance
  of families especially in rural areas to send
  their daughters to school.

15
Why?

• rural or urban residence
• regional location
• migration
• discrimination against the girl child because of
  traditional attitudes

16
OBSTACLES

• cultural norms, Patriarchal traditions
• poverty
• child labor
• structural aspects of national education

17
(No Transcript)
18
(No Transcript)
19
WHAT HAS BEEN ACHIEVED?

• Government programs
• Corporate Social Responsibility projects of
  Turkish companies
• NGO Projects

20
Government Programs

• Come on girls, let's go to school!
• UNICEF has been working closely with the Ministry
  of National Education on the campaign, which was
  launched in 2003, and has helped an additional
  222.800 girls enroll in school

21
Come on girls, let's go to school!
http//www.haydikizlarokula.org/
22
(No Transcript)
23
Corporate Social Responsibility projects of
Turkish companies

• Snowdrops
• Snowdrops is a joint educational project
  developed and managed by the Association in
  Support of Contemporary Living and Turkcell,
  Turkeys leading GSM operator
• http//kardelenler.turkcell.com.tr/

24

• Starting with the scholarship of five thousand
  female students in year 2000, the Snowdrops
  program now provides social, financial and
  mentoring support to 12,300 young Turkish women

25
Daddy, Send Me to School !
The Daddy Send Me To School project, led by the
Milliyet Newspaper in 2005 is still in progress
26

• The Daddy, send me to school campaign that
  began with a donation of 1 million YTL by
  Milliyet Newspaper, Aside from the construction
  of 20 girls dormitories of which 13 are still
  being built, 3 652 students have been given
  scholarships as part of the campaign. The
  campaign's goal for the second year, is to
  increase the number of scholarships given to
  students to 7,000 children
• http//www.bababeniokulagonder.org/

27
Government Programs

• Dealing with the results not the reasons!

28
NGO Projects
Child Education Foundation (ACEV)? Association
for Contemporary Living ERG/ (Education Reform
Initiative)- ACEV/ KADER (Association for
Supporting and Educating Women Candidates )?
29
Association for Contemporary LivingFunctional
Literacy Training Programme for Adults Project
is organizing activities of voluntary trainers
from ÇYYD, through the literacy courses at
primary level. Partners AÇEV, Ministry of
National Education. Starting date 1996,ongoing
30
AÇEV (Mother Child Education Foundation)?
31

ACEV, the first non-governmental organization
to conduct scientific studies geared toward
illiterate adults, developed the Functional Adult
Literacy Program (FALP) a scientifically based
literacy program the equivalent of Level 1
literacy courses of the Ministry of National
Education. This is also the only program that
includes extensive support materials and content
geared at increasing women's participation in
societal life. This program conducting with KADER
and ERG.
32

• Based on the Ministry's Level 1 literacy courses
  of 120 hours of class work, classes take place 3
  times a week (a total of 9 hours), and last
  around 4 months.
• Volunteer educators teach the courses. At certain
  intervals and in accordance with the necessary
  license ACEV has obtained from the Ministry of
  National Education
• ACEV organizes volunteer training seminars for
  high school graduates at least 21 years of age
  that cover 65 hours of course work.
• ACEV also collaborates with various
  non-governmental organizations to enable the
  Functional Adult Literacy Courses to reach wider
  audiences that includes civic education!

33
The Content

• The program aims to enhance comprehension,
  interpretation and critical thinking skills.
• Topics that require literacy skills in daily
  life, such as reading an electricity bill, making
  a grocery list, or filling out an application
  form are also covered. The objective of the
  program is for individuals to utilize literacy in
  ways that make their daily lives easier and
  contribute to their personal development.
• Course work takes place in group discussions,
  reinforcing womens existing knowledge about
  childrens health, general health, reproductive
  health, childrens rights, child education,
  womens rights and communication, and allowing
  them to ask questions pertaining to issues they
  are curious about.
• In addition to literacy techniques, participants
  are offered information on numerous topics such
  as infant care, first aid, child abuse, hygiene,
  nutrition, family planning, reproductive health,
  pregnancy, civil rights, inheritance rights,
  right of girl children to schooling, preparing
  children for school, and inter-family
  communication.

34
RECOMMENDATIONS

• An analysis of the national education system from
  a gender perspective
• Special temporary measures to increase women
  students percentages
• Eradicating negative cultural attitudes and
  practices
• A review of all educational materials from a
  gender perspective
• To establish a data and a monitoring system to
  keep girls in the education system

35

• the establishment of institutional mechanisms
  supported by a strong legal framework and
  sufficient resources.
• Providing training for parents and teachers about
  eliminating discrimination
• Ensuring the equality between men and women both
  in formal and informal education is only possible
  with policies of special measures and practices.

36

• While the medium to long term solution to womens
  illiteracy problem is to make sure girls attend
  school starting in the present, Turkey still
  needs to implement programs for adolescents and
  adult women who are illiterate and have trouble
  participating in the economic, social and
  political life of the country.

37
NGO Programs

• Deal with the reasons aiming women empowerment!

38
Conclusion

• speed up implementation and to take further
  concrete steps
• Advocacy, awareness and resourcees
• Collaborative efforts
• National act plan
• Effective policy

39
List of the some of the Woman Organizations In
Turkey SOGEP (Social Development and Gender
Equality Policies Center)? http//www.sogepgenckad
inlar.org/?pagebilgibankasi Association Of
Supporting and Traninig Women Candidates
KADER www.ka-der.org ACEV (Mother Child Education
Foundation) http//www.acev.org/english/index.asp
WWHR (Women for Womens Human Rights)? http//www
.wwhr.org/ Flying Broom http//en.ucansupurge.org/
Kagider (Women Entrepreneurs Association of
Turkey) http//www.kagider.org/?intPageStructureN
o11sintLanguageID 0bytContentType4strHitCoun
tParam2160261656
40
KAMER (works on violence)? http//www.kamer.org.tr
/kamer20english/main.htm Filmmor Women's
Cooperative http//www.filmmor.org/ Kaosgl (Gay
lesbian organization)? http//news.kaosgl.com/ Lam
bdaistanbul (Gay lesbian organization)? http//www
.lambdaistanbul.org/php/main.php?menuID26 AMARGI
http//www.amargi.org.tr/?qnode/164 AK-DER
(WOMENS RIGHTS ASSOCIATION AGAINST
DISCRIMINATION)? http//www.ak-der.org/?langengp
m d41d8cd98f00b204e9800998ecf8427e BIANET http
//www.bianet.org/english/kategori/women (news
portal) Turkish Republic Prime Ministry General
Directorate On The Status Of Women
http//www.ksgm.gov.tr/
41
TESEKKÜRLER!(THANK YOU!)?
mevludesahil_at_yahoo.com