Grateful for an Education

I'm sure everyone is excited for the long, Christmas break and glad that finals are over.  But amidst the stress that school brings upon us, we are so blessed to be in America and receiving an education.  Here are some stats you can keep in mind:

• There are over 860million illiterate people in the world, of whom:
  • 61% come from Bangladesh, China, India and Pakistan
  • 66% are women
• In 41 countries, including some Central and East European nations, the numbers of children with access to primary education has actually fallen since 2000.
• In OECD countries, the proportion of adults with tertiary education qualifications rose from 22% to 45.6% between 1975 and 2002.
• Over 103.5 million primary school age children worldwide are not enrolled in school. Nearly 57% of these are girls.
• The literacy rate for women aged 15-24 years improved from 78 to 83% between 1990 and 2002, but eliminating gender disparity in education by 2015 is still unlikely.
• There is a worldwide shortage of school teachers and, according to the EFA Report 2002, an extra 15-35 million more teachers will be required to achieve universal primary education by 2015.
• Total aid to basic education in low-income countries almost double between 2000 and 2004.

Retreived from Global Education (http://www.globaleducation.edna.edu.au/globaled/go/cache/offonce/pid/27;jsessionid=122120CCEA2B730BCCB00F42B39226CC) 

Yours Truly, HELP Headquarters