In a world with an increasing emphasis on globalization, statistics show that the opportunity to become educated is becoming more important and harder to obtain.

Cynthia Lloyd, senior associate with the Poverty, Gender and Youth program and chairwoman of the Bixby Fellowship program at the Population Council, delivered a lecture Tuesday night in the Sun Room of the Memorial Union on inequality, poverty and gender gaps in education. Lloyd presented global educational and gender gap statistics from a 2005 study done by the National Research Council titled “Growing Up Global: Can Education Reduce Gender Inequality and Poverty?” Lloyd supplemented most of these statistics with her own, more recent, research.

“Of all the young people today under the age of 24, 86 percent live in developing countries,” Lloyd said.

Lloyd said the transitional stage of young adult development, from ages 10 to 24, is the most important to study when it comes to examining educational and gender gaps. This is the stage, Lloyd said, when the bulk of education takes place and paths for the rest of life are set. She said a moral judgment must take place on the part of the researcher in terms of defining what a “young adult” is. Defining this stage of development is not easy, simply because personal experiences for 10- to-24-year-olds differ wildly from culture to culture, she said.

“The world is changing, and is changing very rapidly. We can’t project our lives onto them,” Lloyd said. “How are we going to write a report on the transition to adulthood when everyone’s experience is going to be different?”

Much of the lecture was focused on statistics, specifically examining where there are high concentrations of primary school dropouts, secondary school enrollment and the proportion of girls enrolling and finishing primary schools versus boys – which Lloyd said is actually increasing.

“In terms of rates of change, the educational rates have risen – especially for girls,” she said.

Lloyd’s research showed that the rate of education is worst in Africa, for a variety of reasons. War, unstable governments and cultural attitudes toward girls getting an education all have affected the educational system in Africa.

Girls are “at a double disadvantage,” Lloyd said, and the reason is twofold. Only wealthy girls are usually able to stay in primary school, and there are general attitudes toward girls staying in school working against them, as well. Lloyd said boys’ rates of enrollment are generally lower in Africa simply because they might have to “stay home and get work,” or they may be conscripted to fight in conflicts. Lloyd pinpointed the problems of decreased enrollment and completion of primary schooling that are common in all developing countries.

Lloyd said a possible good outcome of this is that the “world investment community has finally taken an interest in education,” which means more money and attention has been put into rectifying this situation.

“It made me wonder what we can do to help education in other countries, and it left me confused as to what we can do to make a difference,” said Kristie Miller, freshmen in design-undeclared.