Because of a lack of support in most Mexican societies, many young women and girls must drop out of school early. Among a select few countries, Mexico still has a gender gap in the education system.
In my personal experience, I’ve seen schools let out for large groups of boys to come running out, whereas the significantly smaller groups of girls stick together, seeming uncomfortable.
While many women and men come out of school with the ability to read and write, there are still plenty who don’t. This problem is largely affecting women and young girls because they often need to drop out.
Note: my sources did not show statistics for 2019.
As shown on this chart, there is a relatively high literacy rate for both males and females, but there is a consistent difference between the women’s rate and the men’s rate. For example, the highest rate for men is 99.25% (2018) whereas the highest rate for women is 94.60% (2018). To put this into perspective, the current male population (May 2022) is around 65.5 million, and the current female population is around 67 million. I’ll leave you to do the math.
But why is this happening? Well, for starters, many girls in Mexico are known to leave school before graduating or attending college because of household duties. This means that these duties are still falling on the shoulders of women instead of men.
Beyond that, about 83% of married women do not attend school, and about 25,000 girls in Mexico are married between the ages of 12 to 14 years old.
Lastly, despite most primary schools in Mexico having nearly equal opportunities for both boys and girls to attend school, that’s 49% opportunity for girls and 51% opportunity for boys, most of the girls who can attend, don’t, for the reasons I’ve listed plus more.
So, how could we fix this? The first step is to acknowledge these gaps. They are present, and they are unequal. If you are willing to donate, it is a great way to support this cause. You can donate money to a Goal 4 charity (Global Goals #4, Quality Education) or a Goal 5 charity (Global Goals #5, Gender Equality). You can also research other ways to support this cause.
I said it before and I’ll say it again; too many girls in Mexico can not attend school due to reasons beyond their control. We must work towards educating everyone, otherwise, we are wasting the potential of over half of Mexico, not to mention every other country struggling with this issue. So, don’t waste this opportunity, help in whatever way you can to close the gender gaps in education.
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