Introduction
Elementary education has undergone remarkable growth over the last three decades in the enrollment of the underprivileged societal groups like ethnic, cultural, linguistic, and economic minorities. Due to the rise in the enrollment of learners from the underprivileged groups, learning institutions have largely become diverse. Apparently, schools currently have been hit by a myriad of complex emerging issues and challenges. This aspect requires the relevant authorities to address the rising needs and objectives of diverse learners. This paper will examine and discuss challenges the impact of marriage on the education of children. The paper will predict and suggest what policymakers and school authorities should do in a bid to curb the negative effects emerging from this issue.
The tenacious exclusion practices by teachers, school bureaucracies, and society concerning the underachieving students’ socio-economic, cultural, and political perceptions greatly influence the learners’ capabilities (Cherubini, Hodson, Manley‐ Casimir & Muir, 2010). The assumption that schools are for boys and girls are for marriage is retrogressive; unfortunately, it persists in the contemporary society across the world. This perception largely contributes to early marriages amongst school going girls. This paper will show that early marriages influence children’s education in many ways and the practice has contributed to increased school dropouts especially amongst girls, thus creating a barrier to social justice and personal development.
Overview
Given the significant impacts that early marriage has had on education, this paper builds on the available recent research to establish the extent of early marriage and its impacts on the lives of children. This paper conducts an extensive inquiry to gather information from multi-disciplinary academic articles related to this topic. In addition, the paper incorporates the existing information to build on new and consistent knowledge. Since child development and learning adjustment is a crucial process for both girls and boys, this paper will adopt a balanced model to analyze the impacts of exposing children to early marriages at the cost of their education. According to Nguyen and Wodon (2012), demographic and health surveys indicate that girls and boys below 18 years of age are too young to be involved in marital and reproductive transitions. This tendency contributes to school dropouts or slow intellectual progress, thus lowering their education prospects substantially.
The current statistics
Table 1 below shows data on trends in the occurrence of child marriage for girls below the age of 18 years. This data indicates that child marriage is decreasing, but at a slow pace, and thus the prospect of eliminating early marriage remains elusive. The data show that different income groups influence early marriages with less developed countries recording more cases as compared to their developed counterparts.
The impact of early marriage on education
In many cases, the decision by a girl or her parents to get married at tender age is highly subject to the girl’s potential and capabilities to stand out in school. Girls, who are weak in school, have low prospects in education, and thus they presumably have very little to lose in the future; hence, they are discouraged to go on with studies as compared with girls who have high intellectual capabilities. However, studies have shown that poor performance in school is related to socio-economic, racial, linguistic, and regional disparities. These differences have an adverse effect on the personality and performance of children in school. These impacts are highly pronounced among the learners who belong to the underprivileged families (Cherubini et al., 2010). Early marriage is a major factor contributing to school drop out for female children between the ages of 9 and 17 (Finlay & Neumark, 2008). Some regions have cultural practices that constrain girls from exercising their social justice on decisions to marry. This section will explore the several challenges that affect education of children due to early marriages.
Termination of education
Some cultures gold that girls are for marriage and school should be for the boys. In the developing countries, particularly the northern part of Nigeria, girls should be in their husband’s house during their first menstrual cycle (Nguyen & Wodon, 2012). Some communities even give out girls immediately they are born. When these girls grow and learn of what the family or society expects of them, they are discouraged since nobody expects them to excel in school as opposed to their male counterparts. These cultural practices have led some societies astray by denying the young people the chance to compete in school and make their own decisions in life. When these girls join schools, there are less likely to concentrate since they see themselves as baby-making machines, thus leading to poor performance, which compels them to pull out of school voluntarily. However, girls should be given the right to make personal life choices and societies should ensure that everyone is accorded equal rights to life. On the other hand, boys gradually turn into fathers while in school. The influence of peer pressure is increasingly forcing school going boys to engage in teen sex. Some communities believe in taking responsibilities of personal own choices. Therefore, these young boys are compelled to marry at tender age when they do not have the capacity to have families (Finlay & Neumark, 2008). The pressure of sustaining marriage livelihood becomes demanding and the young boys cannot concentrate in school. They are forced to discontinue their studies and find means to feed their young families.
Isolating girls
When girls marry while in school, they are separated from their peers in school and it takes time to adjust to the new environment with their husbands. This isolation affects the girls’ concentration in schools emotionally and psychologically, thus leading to undesired results. Married girls in most cases find themselves missing classes to cater for family issues and they are forced to do catch up studies. The pressure intensifies, thus forcing them to quit or fail in their studies (Finlay & Neumark, 2008). This aspect affects their social life since they cannot interact with their educated peers. The girls become dependent on their husbands, thus compromising their socio-economic opportunities and power. In case the early married school-age girls become widowed, they have nobody to support their education and with little options to raise their families.
Low quality of education
Studies have shown a close link between early marriage and the quality of education (Finlay & Neumark, 2008). The mainstream perception that learners should marry after completion of their education process creates identity crises and the actual perception of social selves hinders these girls from socializing or conducting discussions in classrooms. For instance, when teachers have to discuss topics relating to early marriages, they might be forced to overlook some important details pertaining the topic mainly to avoid what might look as discussing the married members of the class. Therefore, they do not address the pertinent points surrounding the issue, and thus the quality of education is compromised. The entire class might be misled on some crucial issues regarding early marriage, which might affect their future lives.
Poverty and marriage
Financial stability exerts a substantial impact on a child’s learning and school attendance, and this influence contributes to girls’ early marriage in many ways. The learning institutions incorporate learners from wide social orientations. Children from poor backgrounds are affected psychologically and they end up losing concentration on studies, which leads to poor performance. The teacher-student relationship also plays a significant role. For instance, teachers who label such students as slow learners might encourage them to pull out of school. Parents decide to let their girls marry and reduce the financial burden that come with education. Marital status becomes an influential predictor of school attendance for the married girls. Most girls feel ashamed whilst interacting with fellow students who see them as wives rather than students. The divided attention forces the young girls to pull out or terminate their studies at lower levels (Koppelman & Goodhart, 2011). This aspect undermines the girls’ potential to explore their capabilities and become independent in the future. In addition, early poverty and neglect among young learners gradually develop to adolescence learning disorders. Developmental cognitive studies indicate that early brain development forms the basis of intellectual progress and learning (Egbo, 2009). Therefore, when girls get married while in school, they are further interrupted, and thus they get an excuse to drop out of school. The poverty cycle continues, thus leading to low social status. This aspect does not only affect the young girls, but also the economic growth of a country.
Economic factors
Poor societal value for girls leads to early marriage, but this notion varies across different cultures. In many societies, women are considered as incompetent in the workplace, hence unproductive as opposed to men. Such societies hold that girls create a financial burden, and thus their parents let them be married in a bid to ease such monetary encumbrances. Sometimes, girls get married early to offset their parents’ debts. These girls find it difficult to continue with studies while in marriage, and thus they opt to exit school. Most probably, children of illiterate mothers will have low incentives to go further in education, which projects the poverty cycle to other generations (Finlay & Neumark, 2008).
Teen pregnancy and school exit
Undoubtedly, teen pregnancy has a strong link to school exit for young girls (Cherubini et al., 2010). Girls, who continue learning after getting married, find themselves at the risk of terminating their education once they get pregnant. Given the nature of classroom experiences through interactions and participation, the girls find life unbearable, and thus they decide to drop out and concentrate with marital life.
Gender inequality
In most cases, girls are highly affected by early marriages since they have limited educational opportunities, thus reducing their employment chances and the power to compete with their male counterparts. Victims of early marriage in school are likely to experience gender-based violence and discrimination by fellow students or even teachers (Cherubini et al., 2010). Unfortunately, the few girls who manage to go through the education system while in marriage come out of school hoping to compete in the workforce, but the male-dominated societies have little concern about their skills. They are seen as family house helps, and thus they are denied job opportunities based on their gender. The idea that girls should be married and boys should be educated gives the boys a green light to go pursue their dreams even after they marry. When boys get married, they do not receive backlash from the school fraternity. This aspect builds them psychologically as the support coming from their wives is sufficient for them to further their education unlike girls who find themselves in similar situations.
Change of location and backgrounds
Early marriage means the relocation and adaptation to new environments, maybe across the country or even the continent. These changes imply cultural diversities and integration to new lifestyles in marriage and new environments of learning. The class environment in most cases differs in many ways and it calls for high concentration to catch up, which is insurmountable for married girls. The current state of education faces challenges to uphold equity and tolerance for diverse cultures in school (Egbo, 2009). Due to linguistic disparities, it is hard for girls to adapt to new school environments, while at the same time keeping up with family matters. This pressure compels them to exit school or end up graduating with poor results.
Recommendations
Early marriage among schoolchildren is a violation of human rights and intrusion to personal life as many decisions are made for them by their parents. Therefore, policymakers need to address cultural values that should be improved to protect girls from exploitation on gender-based inequalities. Law enforcers should encourage the affected people particularly the girls to report cases when they feel that their rights are being undermined. Education should be used as an option to alleviate early marriage by creating support systems for the girls’ education and deal with other disparities in learning institutions (Cherubini et al., 2010). Women empowerment should be advocated to ensure a balance in the distribution of education opportunities for everyone.
Conclusion
Despite the significant improvement in the school enrollment of children from all divisions of the society, great disparities exist in terms of gender and the gap intensifies with girls being the most affected particularly by early marriage. Studies have shown that school drop out and low qualities of education are negatively affecting girls that are trapped in early marriages (Koppelman & Goodhart, 2011). Higher learning institutions report a huge gap in gender distribution, by showing that male students dominate these institutions. This aspect implies that many girls end up exiting education institutions at lower stages when they cannot handle both marital issues and education. Therefore, policymakers and the governments should realize that learning institutions and classrooms currently comprise diverse student populations with varying life experiences. Therefore, policymakers should reorient learning institutions coupled with advocating comprehensive and inclusive system to alleviate any form of disparities. Advocacy should be carried out to reduce the prevalence of early marriage by empowering the less privileged sections of the society and ensure that societies develop the culture of learning for all individuals regardless of their gender.
References
Cherubini, L., Hodson, J., Manley‐ Casimir, M., & Muir, C. (2010). Closing the Gap’ at the Peril of Widening the Void: Implications of the Ontario Ministry of Education’s Policy for Aboriginal Education. Canadian Journal of Education 33(2), 329 ‐ 355.
Egbo, B. (2009). Teaching for Diversity in Canadian Schools. Toronto, Canada: Pearson Canada Inc.
Finlay, K., & Neumark, D. (2008). Is marriage always good for children? Evidence from families affected by incarceration. Cambridge, MA: National Bureau of Economic Research.
Koppelman, L., & Goodhart, R. (2011). Understanding human differences: Multicultural education for a diverse America. Boston, MA: Pearson/Allyn & Bacon.
Nguyen, M., & Wodon, Q. (2012). Child Marriage and Education: A Major Challenge. Journal Economics Bulletin, 32(1), 398-411.