The Covid-19 pandemic highlights the need to increase social inclusion and gender equality in education and training around the world, ETF live-stream discussion finds.
There's nothing like a crisis to bring into sharp relief economic and social challenges, as the European Training Foundation's latest online discussion on "Inclusive Education: Inclusive Societies" demonstrated.
Streamed live Wednesday (January 13, 2021) on Facebook and via Zoom, the discussion between Sandra Ribeiro, President of the Portuguese Commission for Citizenship and Gender Equality, Jason Laker, Professor of Higher Education, Student Affairs, and Community Development at the San José State University in California, USA, and Lida Kita, the ETF's Country Coordinator for Serbia, Turkey and Israel and a specialist in vocational education, training and social inclusion, was chaired by Alastair Macphail of the ETF.
With Portugal having taken over the presidency of the Council of the European Union earlier this month, Sandra was able to elucidate the priority her country would be giving to gender equality in the six months it is in charge of the rotating presidency.
The Portuguese presidency would have two thematic priorities, she explained.
"We want to mark the terms of the [Council of Europe's 2011] Istanbul Convention with a conference in April - physical, online or mixed we don't know yet - underlining the importance of combating violence against women, and domestic violence. The conference will also look at the impact Covid has had on domestic violence and the need for robust standards for protection and support."
The second pillar would be to analyse the social and economic impact of Covid on gender equality.
Those aims are not confined to Portugal or Europe alone. Jason, the only North American member of the ETF's editorial board, noted that addressing the erosion of a wide range of gender and social inclusion issues in the United States over the past four years was likely to be a priority for the incoming administration of President-elect Joe Biden.
"Biden is wisely not speaking about accountability of those in the current government who failed in their duty, or used their positions to advance their own personal or financial interests. But he is focusing on appointing very talented people to reform and root out problems; to rebuild and reform government agencies so that they do for people what they are supposed to do."
Working to support a society where cynical politicians did not attempt to manipulate people by seeking to blame "the other" for societal problems - through positive programmes to support social inclusion and move away from rigid gender stereotyping was also something many in the US were now looking at, he added.
The EU approach to promoting social inclusion in its neighbourhood tended to be policy focused, Lida Kita noted, pointing to the EU's framework on developing skills for inclusion.
"In order to make improvements you need to look at the education system to see what is happening, so research is important and that is why the ETF works with governments, researchers, and the private sector to support skills for inclusion."
Ensuring that future workers had the right skills for a fast developing labour market meant that inclusion and equality would likely remain high on the agenda for the foreseeable future.
Planting the seeds of gender equality and social inclusion should start at an early age, Sandra noted.
"The earlier you start, the earlier you understand the question. When you are small things make sense, as you grow up you receive a lot of stereotypes and bias and it is already much more difficult to understand equality."
It was not just about teaching children; to ensure equality and inclusion the teachers themselves needed training and traditional notions of what was right or wrong sometimes needed to be challenged, she said, using the example of female genital mutilation that immigrant to Europe from some African societies regarded as a traditional practice but was actually a crime in their adoptive countries.
"We need a good legislative framework to ensure gender equality and social inclusion," she added.
Supporting that point, Jason emphasised the need for "safely challenging gender norms".
He added: "Tradition is an enforced habit. Simply wearing a pink shirt in some places may cause you trouble. Challenging this requires courage; we need to check our own stereotypes and be willing, in front of others, to support those who are merely expressing themselves."
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