Any work to strengthen economies, expand markets, reduce poverty, and improve the quality of life will be more successful with increased attention to education. Education equips people with the skills they need to participate fully in the economy and society. When countries help their people become educated and skilled everyone benefits.

Real changes occur when girls are allowed to learn, and all people have equal access to at least a basic education. As we enter the 21^st century, we expect educational technology to play an increasingly important role in improving the equity, quality, and effectiveness of education systems around the world.

 Education Home Page
How is the World Bank responding to global challenges in education? This website is the hub for information on the World Bank's work in education and provides an overview of the Bank's education for development strategy (see also Questions and Answers).

 Priorities and Strategies for Education
Why should basic education, girls' education, and equity in education be priorities for development? Read this report for a review of the Bank's last 15 years of educational work and its new strategies for the years to come.

 Investing in Education
An educated workforce can help a country make great advances in development, yet in low-income countries more than 25% of primary school aged children do not even enter the school system. Read this journal article to find out how this problem might be solved.

 ABC for Early Childhood Development
The more we learn about human development, the more we find that proper care--including nutrition, health care, and mental stimulation--in the early years of life is essential. Access this webpage for information about how to improve early childhood development around the world. These links may be particularly useful:

 Global Distance Educationet
What is distance education all about and when is it effective? Visit this site to find out about the various types of distance education available, how to teach and learn with it, and how to establish a distance education program.

 Increasing Bank Lending for Basic Education, Health, and Credit Programs Benefiting Women
What are the Bank lending trends for basic education? This web site provides facts and figures about education and World Bank lending in Asia, Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean, Middle East and North Africa, Europe and Central Asia.

 Women and the Transformation of the 21st Century
Read this speech for James D. Wolfensohn's views on girls' education, delivered at the UN Conference for Women held in Beijing.

 Post-Basic Education and Training
This website contains articles about higher education. Scroll down to find information about the World Bank's participation in UNESCO's World Conference on higher education.

Data: Education

 Human and Intellectual Capital
Visit this site for data on literacy rates, school enrollments, research expenditures, and more. Click on any of the indicators for its definition and ranking of the world's countries. For other competitiveness indicators, click here.

 Explore these pages from World Development Indicators, 1999 to find data on education for over 140 of the world's countries. To view these pages you will need Adobe Acrobat Reader. If you do not have it, you may download it here for free.

• Development Progress
• Education Inputs
• Participation in Education
• Education Outcomes
• Gender and Education
• Gender Differences
• Science and Technology
• Key Indicators for Other Economies

Around the World

• Putting Inputs to Work in Primary Schools: Philippines
• Social Assessment and the El Salvador Basic Education Modernization Project
• Voucher Program For Secondary Schools: The Colombian Experience
• Private Girls' Schools Help Close Pakistan's Education Gender Gap (see also Pakistan: Balochistan Primary Education Program and Participation in the Education and Training Sector)
• Chad: Education V Project
• Educational Quality: Defining What's Important
• Guinea: Equity and School Improvement Project
• Girls and Schools in Sub-Saharan Africa
• Measuring the Gap: Female Education in Sub-Saharan Africa
• Schools Count: World Bank Project Designs and the Quality of African Primary Education

Digging Deeper

 Tackling the Issues
Education is closely linked with other issues that in their turn affect the quality and availability of learning opportunities. Check out these links and see for yourself how issues like Gender, Health, Information and Communications affect education.

 Education and Technology
How can computers and other technologies be used in classrooms in developing countries? Is it cost effective? This website provides links to a series of papers that explore some of the most pressing and controversial questions involving educational technology--especially as it pertains to developing countries.

Resources

 Development Education Program
Explore Sustainable Development in the classroom with these on-line learning modules. This site, created for the secondary school level, covers social, economic, and environmental issues of development. The maps, charts, data tables, text, and case studies are all based on World Bank research and knowledge.

 World Links for Development
Interested in doing collaborative Internet projects with other schools around the world? Or trying to find out more about using the Internet in your classroom? The World Links program assists secondary schools in developing countries to get on-line, trains teachers to use the Internet, and helps schools in industrial and developing countries link up for collaborative projects.

 Global Links Television
Access this site to view video clips and to find information about how to order video tapes from the World Bank's educational television series: Global Links. Offerings include the Education for All series with programs on education in Korea, Bangladesh, and Chile.

 Access and Equity in Education
This site offers materials on girls' education for order. Choose from a range of materials available including a video called Invisible Voices: Girls' Education in Gambia, research handbooks, and a tool kit on girls' education.