24 February 2014

As education is subject to increasing privatisation, a human rights analysis of the processes and impacts has remained largely neglected. The Right to Education Project publishes a new report - Privatisation of Education: Global Trends of Human Rights Impacts, together with a factsheet and a training module, to increase awareness of the issues surrounding the privatisation of education, from a much needed human rights perspective.

The report - Privatisation of Education: Global Trends of Human Rights Impacts, is based on 18 social research pieces on different types of private education across a variety of countries in Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia, which were commissioned by Privatisation in Education Research Initiative (PERI) in 2012. These research pieces have been analysed using a human rights framework in order to identify the impacts – both, negative and positive - vis-à-vis the privatisation of education.  The report concludes by making recommendations to various stakeholders and identifying the potential areas for further human rights-focused research on privatisation of education.

The factsheet on 10 Human Rights Standards for Education Privatisation provides basic information on the right to education as it relates to education privatisation, focusing on the most central international human rights legal standards that relate to privatisation. The factsheet may be used to raise awareness among government officials, policy-makers, donors, teachers, private education providers, and other education stakeholders.  It will also aid civil society organisations in understanding education privatisation as a human rights issue and in developing a rights-based position.

The two-days training module seeks to uncover how the right to education may be impacted by privatisation and explores methods for challenging privatisation that negatively impacts education rights. The module includes notes and presentation slides. It contains a session-by-session breakdown of activities, including presentations, discussion questions, and group exercises. The module is designed to be delivered by non-legal education experts.

Additional information on the privatisation of the right to education is available on the Right to Education Project’s website.