CHAPITRE II :
THE SEARCH OF MORE
CONCRETE SOLUTIONS AND ALTERNATIVES TO THE CHILD WORK
The international community began to quickly eliminate work
from the children under dangerous conditions and, later on with
éradiquer completely the plague which constitutes the child work.
However, it would be completely utopian, to think of being able to withdraw the
children purely and simply work which they carry out without their proposing of
the solutions of replacement. The result would be then completely contrary to
that discounted and would increase considerably the misery of these children.
Among these solutions of replacement all the States must
provide the children not working an education of quality and accessible to
all ; it is in this paramount requirement that undoubtedly the principal
solution resides at the problem of the child work, and therefore to support
education is a starting point essential to the eradication of the child work
(Section I). However, the fight against the child work must be carried out on
several faces at the same time to be effective. It is essential to obtain a
broad consensus within the public opinion and of the community concerned, so
that the situation of these children develops
(Section II).
SECTION I :
To support
education : an essential starting point
So that education is a true solution with the problem of the
child work, one needs that it is offered to all the children, including those
which are currently with work but those are most of the time not very inclined
to leave their work
(Paragraph I), because they undoubtedly estimate
rightly that education is not appropriate to their waitings (Paragraph II).
Paragraphe I :
To succeed in
bringing the children to the school
The assessment of « education for all »
realized in 2000 by the UNICEF, the most complete evaluation ever carried out
as regards development of education, shows that the rate Net of inscription at
the primary school increased in the Nineties in all the areas of the world.
However, the objective stated in the International Conventions, such as the
International Convention relating to the rights of the child, of the universal
access to basic education was not achieved. There remains indeed, nearly 130
million children who are not provided education for ; this figure would be
even 404 million if one considers the whole of less than ten eight years.
Thanks to these figures, it is rather easy to establish the link between the
child work and nonthe access to education, since among the 250 million children
who work, the ILO estimates at 120 million the number of those which work
full-time, and cannot thus profit from a schooling.
The installation of an education of quality in countries where
the child work is very developed runs up against a not easily comprehensible
problem : the children always do not wish to go to the school but prefer
on the contrary to continue to work. Indeed, the hard-working children
themselves do not show a great enthusiasm with the idea to enter a system of
education which, most of the time, already disappointed the majority of those
which attended it for a short period. They denounce the treatment inhuman and
degrading whose are victims much hard-working children during the hours of
school, and especially the maladjustment of the school. They want well to learn
how to read and write but they do not ask however that the school is the
principal activity of childhood. In a study undertaken near the children of the
streets in Brazil and Paraguay a considerable part of the questioned children
said to prefer to continue to work rather than to turn over to the school.
Having known the dangerous freedom of the street, these children are indeed the
least likely to run themselves again within the framework of a traditional
school. It then becomes all the more difficult to meet their educational needs.
In any event, that it is by choice or financial obligation, of the million
children cannot leave their work : it is necessary thus that it is the
school which comes to them so that they can benefit from its benefits.
Almost all the attempts made to bring education to the
children who work were carried out within the framework of programs independent
of the education system. One of the most known programs is undoubtedly the
program of the rural Committee for the rural development of Bangladesh (BRAC)
which deals with children from 8 to 14 years. This program recognizes that the
majority of the children who it frequent devote most of their day to be worked
in their hearth or the fields : consequently the school day does not
exceed two hours and half. Moreover, it is imperative that this type of
structure takes account of the daily and seasonal rates/rhythms of the life,
such as the periods of harvests. These establishments are installed close to
the dwellings of the pupils avoiding to them ways too far after working days
sometimes quite tiring. The distance of the schools to see their absence in
broad geographical areas is also one of the causes of their nonfrequentation by
the rural populations. Lastly, and it is an essential point there, because it
is the reproach running made more at the school in the developing countries,
teaching insists on competences practice corresponding to the environment of
the child. The results of this program are excellent since more than 95% of the
pupils complete the three years cycle and most of the time continue at the
traditional primary school. There are approximately 3.000 schools of the BRAC
offering an access to basic education to nearly a million children bangladais,
in the campaigns or the cities.
Another solution to facilitate the access to the education of
the children to work is to directly bring education to the children. The idea
of « teachers of street » is developed today everywhere in
the world. It was born in Latin America where teachers contacted the children
of the streets in order to help them to turn over to the school. These programs
then developed throughout the world under the name of « schools
of the streets » or of « mobile schools » or
of « return to the school », and touched more than 60.000
children in the Philippines. The teachers use the pedagogy of the wish to allow
the children to draw up plans with a future. The children thus learn how to
read and write but they can work at the same time or make a vocational
training. Moreover, one considerable aspect of these schools of the streets is
that they allow a certain framing of these children, sometimes avoiding to them
falling into the traps which they can meet the every day in the street. The
teachers also allow these children to reach certain medical care, and provide
regular shelters and meals, thus improving their medical situation.
The supreme goal of education for all is of long-term
éradiquer the child work. Indeed, the step is registered on several
generations : the withdrawn children of work and receiving a
qualification, would have a less arduous work and remunerated better and will
thus not be obliged, once adult, to send their children to work. The vicious
circle of poverty involving poverty would then be broken, with the profit of
the circle of the instruction : the parents having profited from the
benefits of a basic education will be more inclined to want to inform their
children. However, to be able to implement these principles, very creditable,
one cannot be satisfied to punctually set up schools of the streets. Nonformal
education, i.e. apart from institutional structures, even if it has many
advantages and excellent results, should not make forget that it is an
institutional system of basic education very important that the developing
countries must set up as soon as possible.
Once this system set up, it will be necessary to modify the
teaching which cannot remain just as it is because it is not in adequacy with
waitings of the families and the children. There are indeed necessary to
succeed in making remain the children at the school thanks to gravitational
programs and an increased accessibility.
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