Teenaged, married, and out of school: Effects of early marriage and childbirth on school exit in Eastern Africa
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Teenaged, married, and out of school: Effects of early marriage and childbirth on school exit in Eastern Africa Carina Omoeva1 · Rachel Hatch1
Accepted: 23 September 2020 © UNESCO IBE 2020
Abstract This article investigates the relationship of early marriage to school participation and whether other factors, including individual or family characteristics and childbirth, moderate the relationship. It uses national household survey data for Eastern Africa, pooled at the regional level. Overall, findings confirm that marriage and schooling appear largely incompatible across the Eastern Africa region at present. The results of the main analysis indicate that married girls are roughly 31 percentage points less likely to be attending school than their unmarried peers. The effect of marriage on school participation trumps other observed factors, including childbirth. Based on an extended analysis using the timing of marriage and two consecutive years of education data in Malawi and Kenya, the article concludes that marriage is a predictor of subsequent school exit. Keywords Early marriage · School participation · School exit · Childbirth · Eastern Africa With the expansion of universal primary enrolment policies in sub-Saharan Africa, gender balance in primary school participation improved considerably, and girls now attend primary school at almost the same rate as boys. Gains in primary, however, have not carried This research was conducted through the FHI 360 Education Policy and Data Center. The authors are grateful to Benjamin Sylla, who, while with the FHI 360 Education Policy and Data Center, developed the age adjustment methodology used in this article that allows analysis of the timing of school exit and marriage. This article builds on analysis he conducted examining the relationship of early marriage, school exit, and pregnancy in Nigeria and Malawi. The authors would also like to thank current and former FHI 360 colleagues Anne Smiley, Annette Brown, and Ahlam Kays for their critical review and helpful comments. * Rachel Hatch [email protected] Carina Omoeva [email protected] 1
FHI 360, 1825 Connecticut Avenue NW, Washington, DC 20009, USA
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over to secondary. For every 100 boys, only 84 girls enrolled in upper secondary school across the region in 2018, up from 80 in 2000 (UIS 2020). The reasons for this gender gap are numerous: school fees, greater travel distances to secondary schools, absence of water and sanitation facilities, and financial pressures on families often disproportionately affect girls. In addition to these obstacles, a small but growing empirical literature and a more extensive advocacy literature suggest that the social and cultural pressures for young women to marry and begin a family at school-going ages are linked to lower female school participation (Klugman et al. 2014; Samati 2013; UNFPA 2012). On the one hand, girls who marry early (before the age of 18) are said to have marital responsibilities at odds with school going, and li
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