Senegal

Basic Data
Official Country Name:	Republic of Senegal
Region:	Africa
Population:	9,987,494
Language(s):	French, Wolof, Pulaar, Jola, Mandinka
Literacy Rate:	33.1%
Number of Primary Schools:	3,884
Compulsory Schooling:	6 years
Public Expenditure on Education:	3.7%
Libraries:	30
Educational Enrollment:	Primary: 1,026,570
	Secondary: 215,988
	Higher: 24,081
Educational Enrollment Rate:	Primary: 71%
	Secondary: 16%
	Higher: 3%
Teachers:	Primary: 18,373
Student-Teacher Ratio:	Primary: 56:1
	Secondary: 24:1
Female Enrollment Rate:	Primary: 65%
	Secondary: 12%

History & Background

Senegal, a West African republic on the westernmost tip of Africa, is a country of remarkable beauty, tradition, and human diversity. Dakar is the capital and largest city. Geographically, the country is almost split by the presence of Gambia, a slender nation situated on both the north and south bank of the Sénégal River.

The national language is Wolof; however, French is the official language. Other languages spoken are Pulaaar, Serer, Diola, Mandingo, and Soninke. Approximately fifteen percent of Senegalese people can understand or read and write French.

The climate is tropical or Sahelian, that is, transitional between the Sahara on the north and the moister regions to the south. The average annual temperature is 29(C) 84(F). There is a short rainy season as well as a long dry season. To the north are found grasslands, or, increasingly, as the desert ecosystem creeps southward, desert. To the south and the southeast are found heavier vegetation and trees. The terrain is flat or gently undulating, but foothills are found in the extreme southeast. Decades of drought in the entire Sahel region of Africa, along with Senegal's population growth, have put severe pressures on the natural environment.

Groundnut oil was for years the major export and foreign exchange earner. Recently it has been surpassed by, first, the fish industry, and, second, by tourism (101 billion CFA francs in 1999). However, agriculture employs more workers than any other sector. Per capita income in 1998 was US$520.

Archaeological findings confirm that Senegal was inhabited in prehistoric times by both Paleolithic and Neolithic civilizations. Islam became established in the region in the eleventh century, and in the thirteenth and fourteenth century Senegal came under the influence of the Mandingo empires to the east.

Trade links with Europe were established from the fifteenth century on, first by the Portuguese and then by the Dutch, British, and French. The relationship remained an economic one until Senegal became a colony of France in 1895. Only after World War II was a territory assembly formed and citizens given the right to vote.

Senegal achieved its independence from France in 1960, first becoming a part of the Mali Federation, but later that same day becoming an independent republic. Senegal long enjoyed preeminence over other French colonies in Africa. Dakar was the capital of French West Africa and became the center from which the French governed and developed their African empire. As such, it was a center for education, providing greater access to Western education. Along with the other three "communes," Goreé, Rufisque, and Saint Louis, its citizens were granted full citizenship rights.

Its European-patterned system of education produced assimilés who prized French educational ideals. Such a system was designed to draw the best minds out of society and train them for positions of leadership in government and civil administration. The Senegalese education was at one time regarded as the finest in francophone Africa, although over the past several decades certain factors have contributed to a decline in the quality of education.

Senegal is a republic with a strong presidency, a weak legislature, and a somewhat independent judiciary. Abdoulaye Wade, who had tried four times for the presidency, was elected president in March of 2000. His election was widely hailed as a triumph for the democratic constitutional system. In Wade's campaign, he emphasized physical infrastructure, education, and the fight against corruption as his main development priorities.

Senegal has a rich tradition of the griot, a storyteller/performer/wise person. It is also rich in literary treasures. Notable works of literature include the tales of Birago Diop, Mariama Bâ's powerful womanist novel Une si longue lettre (So Long a Letter ), and Ken Bugul's Le Baobab fou. Bâ's novel is of particular interest to educators as it tells the story of a woman teacher's life and relationships.

It must be remembered too that the first president of newly independent Senegal in 1960 was Leopold Senghor, a poet and classicist. Senghor was a leader in the Négritude movement, a protest against the French policy of assimilation and a reassertion of the positive values of African culture. Another notable writer was Cheikh Anta Diop, who died in 1986, a modern champion of African identity and African unity.

The social and cultural life of Senegal is strongly influenced by traditional religious values. In this the Marabouts, or traditional religious leaders, play a key role at all levels, both spiritual and temporal. Senegal is predominately a rural, Islamic, polygamous, traditional, and ethnically diverse society. Although women have equal rights under the law, they have little decision-making power at the higher levels of social and economic life; this is in spite of the fact that women are highly active in the lower levels of economic life. Women's illiteracy and lack of access to the information system represent a serious obstacle to family well being. Children are highly valued, representing a woman's social worth and status. Contraceptive use is low, and most families are said to desire more than the average 6.4 children (Cain and Schuman 1994). The majority of the population of Senegal is rural (about 64 percent), but this is rapidly changing with migration to the cities and environmental changes in the countryside.

Poverty remains a serious presence in Senegal and can clearly be tied to the lack of opportunities for women. Per capita income has remained scarcely unchanged since independence in 1960. A minimum weekly wage is guaranteed at 27 dollars per week. However, cost of living estimates set a weekly need at 36 dollars per wage earner (Cain and Schuman 1994). About 50 percent of the population still do not have access to clean drinking water. The substantial foreign assistance received through Senegal's cooperation with foreign nongovernmental organizations amounts to about 15 percent of the GNP.

Constitutional & Legal Foundations

The constitution calls for a free, compulsory, and universal education for children between the ages of six and fourteen. It also provides for a Minister of National Education, a Minister of Technical Education and Training (responsible for vocational and technical education), a Minister of Popular Education (responsible for adult literacy), and a Minister of Youth and Sports. All of these ministries are involved in the complexities of national planning for education. However, the bias is toward the formal school system. For example, less than one half of one percent of the Ministry of Education's budget goes toward improving literacy among the adult population (Cain and Schuman 1994).

In the first years of independence, it became clear that the broad vision of universal education as called for by the constitution would not be immediately obtainable because of a dire shortage of qualified teachers and a restricted number of classrooms. Furthermore, the question of absorbing that number of educated people into the occupational structure became a concern. Serious conflict about the educational policies of the government ensued, with a series of strikes by primary and secondary students, teachers, and teachers' unions.

In 1969 a reform began that involved a change in short-term goals. The goal became one of enabling 50 percent of all children to gain access to primary education by the year 2000. To avoid unemployment among graduates, expansion was deliberately slowed.

In 1971, a National Education (Basic Aims) act was adopted by the National Assembly which defined Senegalese national education as "a specifically African education, rooted in but rising above and transcending African realities in such a way as to transform them and bring about the full flowering of African cultural values..." (M'Bengue 1973). It charged the educational system with the use of national languages and modern educational techniques.

However, to this time Senegal lacks a consensus on what it means to "Senegalize" the educational system (Rideout and Babayoko 1994). For the educated elite, the issue is how to preserve the prestigious francophone system; for the less elite, it means creating a system, materials, and curriculum that reflect African languages and reality.

Lack of resources coupled with population growth and a rapidly declining average age (half the population is under age sixteen) more than doubled the school-age population in three decades, which classroom construction, materials development, and teacher education could not begin to keep pace with. Desperation, dismay, and anger resulted from students and recent graduates who have become cynical about their prospects for finding appropriate jobs.

These realities forced the government of Senegal in the 1980s to begin examining reform schemes and alternative methods of education. President Diouf gave in to repeated calls to convene what was to be called the Etats Généraux de l'Education (EG). That designation was chosen because of its traditional links to democracy and reform in France and because it showed the intention to represent diverse elements of the body politic. The EG produced an impressive degree of consensus in its recommendations: universal primary school enrollment, Islamic education and instruction in national languages within the formal school system, greater interaction between school and community, and greater recognition of teachers as active development agents who should be provided with adequate facilities.

Curriculum decisions are made at the national level by the Ministry of Education in consultation with interested parties. Materials are developed by the National Institute for Research and Actions for the Development of Education (INEADE), sent to the local levels for consultation, and then officially adopted. The process shows a highly centralized decision-making structure but a lack of follow-up support to implement changes.

Educational System—Overview

Before the establishment of a European educational system, Koranic schools educated young males in the teachings of Islam and often in reading and writing Arabic. Today, the Islamic-Arabic element of education is practically absent from the public school curriculum. To compensate, students sometimes participate in parallel educational programs, absenting themselves from public school part of the time. Reformers, particularly the Tidjane of the urban areas, started a system of schools with the help of the Federation of Moslem Cultural Associations of Senegal. These schools provide an Arabic education which permits entry into higher secondary schooling in the Arab world (Michel 1988).

During the first twenty years of Senegal's independence, President Senghor (alleged to have said, "French is the language of the Gods") and others staunchly defended maintaining the French education model. Its programs, structures, and aims continued to make it "an apprentice of the French school" (Rideout and Bagayoko 1994). Despite reform efforts which have repeatedly pressed for a "specifically African" curriculum, the language of instruction remains predominately French.

Despite evidence of the benefits of mother tongue instruction, the local publishing industry has been slow to produce such materials, partly because of the diversity of languages which dilutes the demand for materials in any one language. Local language materials are also two or three times as expensive to produce as materials in French because of smaller production runs and higher start-up costs. World Bank figures from 1986 show that 153,000 textbooks in French are produced in the country, in contrast to 4,140 in Wolof and 532 in Diola (Vawda and Patrinos 1999).

Attendance rates vary widely from as much as 93 percent of school-age children in urban areas to as low as 10 percent in some rural areas (Cain and Schuman). Whether children attend formal school or not, they are instilled with the mores of their society from an early age. Children of five or six have family responsibilities and, at about the age of eight, they begin to receive formal occupational training. Most Senegalese ethnic groups have a formal system of apprenticeship through which knowledge, skills, and expectations are passed along from mothers to daughters and from fathers to sons (Michel 1988).

Illiteracy, however, remains high. Of the population that is age 15 and over, 52 percent of men and 72 percent of women are illiterate. This shows some reduction in illiteracy from the 1980 figures, which showed 78 percent of men and 88 percent of women to be illiterate.

Private schools represent an important part of the education sector. At the middle and secondary level, private institutions, largely Catholic, enroll about 28 percent of the students (Cain and Schuman 1994). The convergence of several factors has given Senegal a particular advantage in developing private sector education. These factors include intellectual and academic freedom, an infrastructure capable of supporting educational institutions, and an exceptionally strong faith in the value of academic intellectual pursuits inherited from both its French and Muslim ancestry.

Private schools provide education not only for the children of the elite. Middle class and working class families make enormous sacrifices to pay for private education because they believe it will bring about a more secure economic future for their children. Most private schools are religious institutions. They are required to follow the government-approved curriculum, use government recommended textbooks, and employ licensed teaching staff. Some receive government subsidies to meet operating expenses. Students from private institutions are admitted to state examinations and may receive state diplomas.

Special education for students with disabilities is still not well developed; however, in 1992 there were five special schools providing programs for about 400 students (Sow 1995). Reliable statistics on the need for such schools are not yet available.

The UNESCO Regional Office for Education in Africa is located in Dakar, serving 43 member states and providing a valuable resource. It also hosts a multimedia center including books, periodicals, and other research material.

In April of 2000, Senegal hosted a major conference on education, dubbed Education for All 2000, under the auspices of the Education For All Forum, based at UNESCO headquarters. Senegal is one of the strongest adherents to the Education For All initiative, with a goal of universal education by the year 2008.

Preprimary & Primary Education

Preprimary schools, mainly private ones, are found in urban areas but they are not widely available. Often children are sent to Koranic schools to learn the fundamentals of Islam before they enter primary education and begin the task of learning French.

The school year is divided into three terms, starting in October and ending in June. An average week consists of approximately 30 hours of classes. As a part of the school reform of 1971, primary school was shortened from six to five years. After the five years, students may take the state examination known as the certificat des études primaires élénebtaures (CEPE). Students who pass this test can then take the examen d'entrée en sixième, a highly competitive screening examination. Not everyone who passes both examinations attends secondary schools because of family poverty and lack of space in the schools. Class size averages 70 students per class in urban schools and 48 per class in rural areas.

During the early years of primary school, a large percentage of the time is devoted to teaching children French, which will be the main language of instruction for most of them. Besides French, reading, writing, and arithmetic are the beginning subjects. In later years children are introduced to history, geography, natural science, music, art, and physical education.

The gap between male and female enrollment is narrowing since the early days of independence. In urban areas, the number of male and female students is nearly the same. In rural areas, there continues to be a significant gap.

In the late eighties, attempts were made to accommodate more children in schools. Some steps taken were double sessions, multigrade classrooms, the use of associate teachers who have received only one year of training instead of four, and the return of many primary school teachers from administrative duties to classrooms. As a result of such efforts, about 65,000 additional primary school children were accommodated in 1988 alone. Some significant elements of reform called for by the Etats Générals still remain to be carried out. They include the transformation of textbooks to being based upon Senegalese rather than French experience, published in Senegal, and distributed free of charge to students. They also include instruction in the maternal languages during the early years of primary education and religious education in the public schools.

Secondary Education

The several hundred elementary schools channel students into approximately 140 middle schools (college d'enseigement moyen ). Those who are able to pass the stringent exams (fewer than half of the middle school students) are eligible to enter the approximately 45 general and specialized high schools (lycées ). Most of those who enter lycée are able to complete its seven-year curriculum. However, only about 40 percent of these are able to pass the baccalauréat examinations.

The educational reform plan provided for another type of school, the intermediate practical education school, to provide a four-year course beyond primary school. Those who finish this cycle of courses are expected to enter the work force; there is no provision for entering another level of formal education. Students are expected to work in agriculture, skilled labor, handicrafts, and so on.

Senegalese people consider a traditional lycée education to be the highest form of education. The institutions continue to maintain their prestige, seeking to admit only highly qualified students and maintaining an upper age limit of 13 years. President Senghor, as a classicist, had strong influence on the secondary school curriculum. Senegal is one of the few countries of the world where Latin is a compulsory subject in secondary school. Greek and Arabic are both also offered at the secondary level (Michel 1988).

Higher Education

A passing grade on the baccalauréat examination at the end of lycée, as well as an appropriate grade record and recommendations, is required for admission to one of Senegal's two universities, University Cheikh Anta Diop in Dakar and University Gaston Berger of Saint-Louis. The language of instruction is French, and the academic calendar runs from October to July.

University Cheikh Anta Diop (UCAD, formerly named University of Dakar) is the flagship educational institution with several professional schools. About 23 research institutes are attached. The five faculties are: law and political science, medicine, science and technology, arts and humanities, and economics and management. Today it enrolls about 20,000 students, but in 1993 the university, designed for 5,000 students, encompassed about 30,000. The inflated numbers were brought about by academic years interrupted by student strikes, as well as other situations which created a large number of students who weren't finishing their studies. The university rector convinced the government of Senegal to declare the 1994 to 1995 academic year an année non validée. This in effect failed the entire student body. 7,000 students were ousted and the rest put on notice. The rector also tightened admission standards, lowering the number of students to a manageable level.

A World Bank grant has made a new library at UCAD possible. However, there are practically no funds for increasing or improving the collection. "Private" libraries run by individual departments or individual professors make inadequate attempts to compensate for the university's lack of resources. Student fees for tuition and room and board represent only a token payment, which some students manage to evade. Many students support life in Dakar by running businesses out of their dormitory rooms. It is said that the room and board charges aren't even enough to cover the cost of the electricity needed to carry out these businesses, such as telecenters or cafes.

The smaller of the two universities, University Gaston-Berger of Saint-Louis, was founded in 1990. It has a faculty of 89 and an enrollment of 2,157. The four teaching units are arts and social sciences, law, economics and management, and applied mathematics and computer science. A large number of Senegalese students get their higher education abroad, most in French-speaking countries, but about 540 are enrolled annually in the U.S.

Distance learning in the form of the African Virtual University (AVU) is available through both universities. Courses offered include management subjects, information technology, and English. In 2001, about 150 students were enrolled in AVU courses. There is no age limit to access higher education to the point where it is estimated that adults comprise at least 15 percent of the total enrollment of formal schooling.

The director of higher education has drafted an ambitious plan to create ten regional university centers, each focused on a local strength or industry. For example, agriculture and tourism are to be the focus in Casamance, fisheries in the north, and mining and industry in Tambacounda and Kaolack.

Administration, Finance, & Educational Research

The education sector is part of the civil service and, as such, is protected by powerful syndicats. Inspectors, public primary-school and lycée directors, and teachers are all civil servants. Teachers must satisfy the government pedagogical standards in order to be licensed, and only licensed institutions can qualify students for state examinations.

Public expenditures on education amounted to 30.9 percent of current governmental expense in 1990. This was 4.0 percent of the GNP. By 1997, the percent of GNP devoted to education was down to 3.4 percent (UN Demographic Yearbook for 1997).

Funds for education come out of the government's national budget, from local funds, and sometimes from foreign aid. Teachers' salaries are the main expenditure for education by the government. Local areas often do their part by providing a school building with the result that sometimes there are school buildings sitting empty for lack of teachers.

All of the upheavals in education, along with the variety of coping strategies relied upon by the government of Senegal, such as multigrade classrooms, double shifts, and junior teachers, have highlighted the urgency for collecting information about student achievement throughout the country. In 1993, the government set about instituting a plan for gathering and interpreting such data. With assistance from foreign entities, the National Institute for Research and Actions for the Development of Education (INEADE) was given the responsibility of managing this assessment program. Along with this assessment plan has been the "pilot schools" project, which began in 1992. The pilot schools project redesigns the curriculum to take advantage of the local community and what it has to offer, to involve the local communities in school activities, and to foster partnerships with economic or cultural agents in the communities. One hundred pilot schools have been chosen for this project.

Nonformal Education

Radio has been credited with being one of the most effective means of nonformal education. A rural educational program called Dissoo (meaning both dialogue and study) was begun in 1968. It has long featured educational discussions, an early form of the talk show.

Adult education centers exist throughout the country, originally established with the help of UNESCO. The Centre d'expansion rurale polyvalente (CERP) was responsible to carry out such programs, usually led by a specialist such as a nurse or health officer, a veterinary agent, an agricultural or forestry agent, or a teacher. Animateurs rurals (rural motivators) played a crucial role in such education. The rural motivator returned to his or her village after training with the expectation that he or she will spread knowledge and motivate people into community action for improvement.

The tax system compels employers to allocate 1 percent of their payroll to the government to implement jobtraining programs. The Office National de Formation Professionnelle (National Office for Professional Training) was set up for this purpose in the early 1990s (Sow, 1995).

The famous historic Goreé Island near Dakar, where buildings used for the slave trade are preserved, forms an important educational site for Africans and others alike. Countless visitors have experienced the emotional impact of seeing the actual spot where their ancestors were present, either as slaves or as profiteers. The place has been named a UNESCO World Heritage site.

Teaching Profession

Primary-school teachers are trained in the écoles normales. Technical school teachers are trained in the two technical teacher training colleges. Secondary school teachers must have earned the maîtrise (a diploma obtained after one or two years of study following the license, which takes three years). The university also prepares instructors for middle-level teacher training colleges over the two-year period after they have completed their first year of university education. At the university level, there are five levels of faculty, plus the highest level, professeur titulaire de chaire, which carries life tenure.

Approximately 22 percent of school teachers are female, and men are more likely than women to occupy administrative posts in schools. In 1990, schools employed just over 16,000 full-time teachers (Sow 1995). Shortages of teachers in mathematics, the physical sciences, and classical languages are frequent, while schools in rural areas and other undesirable locations are often difficult to staff. To address the latter problem, government policy calls for beginning teachers to be sent to such posts before accepting their application for an urban position. At the primary level, a long-standing program of two hours per week peer coaching has been carried out in all public schools since the early seventies, providing an irreplaceable form of professional development and education.

The training of private school teachers is conducted by the private schools themselves. The Catholic system has set up its own training institutions to meet this need.

In the late 1970s, teachers' unions demanded radical improvements in the school situation, leading to reforms in 1981 (Sow 1995). It is the teachers' unions, along with student unions, that have brought about the greatest changes to the curriculum. This is in spite of the fact that, after the strikes of 1979-1980, a number of the union leaders were dismissed from their teaching posts.

Summary

There are many positive factors that can contribute to a bright future for education in Senegal: a stable government, strong religious traditions and social ethical teachings, a leadership role in Africa, and a strong value attached to education on the part of the leadership.

However, there is a minority of the elite that still view education as a highly selective system to reinforce the existing economic and social structures. This is the group that is most resistant to any moves away from a French-centered education. Also, a high turnover of ministers in the Department of Education creates instability, which contributes to delays in implementing positive change.

Seventy-two percent of women are still illiterate. Statistics show that polygamy decreases with the level of education of the woman. In 1993 some 50 percent of women without formal education were in polygynous unions. In contrast, 32 percent of women with primary education were in such unions and 28 percent of women with a secondary education (Pison and others 1995).

Gross inequities still exist based upon geographical location, especially urban vs. rural and coastal vs. interior locations. There are no upper secondary schools at all nor any teacher training institutes in rural areas. Poverty is an enormous hurdle. To put things in perspective, this is a country with 1.3 telephones per 100 inhabitants, 5 newspapers per 1,000 inhabitants, and 41 television sets per 1,000 inhabitants.

There is one particularly serious issue on the horizon, which must be addressed before Senegal can reverse the backward slip in educational attainments for its people of lower socioeconomic levels. That obstacle is international debt contracted in an earlier era. HIPC (the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries Initiative) is attempting to relieve this situation. However, Oxfam International's research demonstrates that unsustainable debt will remain a formidable obstacle to poverty reduction and hence to educational development.

Debt servicing is estimated to amount to as much as 35 percent of total revenues in Senegal. Debt repayment is expected to exceed the country's combined health and education budgets. Structural readjusting has already resulted in substantial reductions of funds to education. The new government's commitment to ambitious education reforms and to the Quality Education for All programs, which aims to achieve universal primary school enrollment by 2008, will seriously be undermined if the world community cannot solve this problem for Senegal, as for most African countries in a similar bind.

HIV/AIDS is another factor destined to affect the development of and support for education. Although, no doubt due in part to the Islamic value system and geography, the crisis has affected Senegal to a lesser degree than many other African countries. In 1999 some 79,000 cases of HIV/AIDS infection were reported in Senegal. The Ministry of Education has mandated the integration of HIV/AIDS education into natural science courses during the last two years of secondary school, but so far curriculum design has lagged behind.

In summary, Senegal has far to go to achieve the educational goals of its constitution and the changes called for in its various bold reform plans. On the positive side are such factors as a stable government and social structure, a democratic political system, a tradition that values education, a consultative system for educational change, and a history of positive cooperation with nongovernmental organizations of various kinds, both foreign and domestic. Obstacles to be overcome include severe gender inequities in all areas of social, cultural, religious, and economic life; the economic effects of debt servicing; a population that does not show a high level of confidence in the possibilities of education to solve their life's problems; and a highly centralized and costly bureaucratic administrative structure for educational decision making.

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—Linda Yoder