Chapter 10

Gender Equity

Abstract Sustainable Development Goal 5 refers to achieving gender equality and

empowering all women and girls. Gender equity is a human right and a precon-
dition for advancing development and reducing poverty. Empowered and educated
women contribute to the health, wealth and productivity of families and commu-
nities and improve the prospects for future generations. This chapter illustrates the
ways in which open and distance non-formal education are being used in devel-
oping countries to help woman and girls access education, become literate, reduce
poverty, improve health, help achieve their civic and political rights and engage in
activities that enhance their status.

Keywords Open and distance learning Non-formal education
Developing



countries Gender equity Gender issues

Introduction

Mao Zedong proclaimed ‘Women hold up half the sky’. About 186 countries have
signed the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against
Women (UN Women 1979). However, the full emancipation of the world’s women
is still far off. Many women and girls in developing countries are still undervalued,
subject to abuse and discriminated against in matters such as health, education and
marital, parental, employment, inheritance and property rights.
In the developing countries, around 75 million girls are out of school, one in five
never completes their primary schooling and one in seven marries before the age of
fifteen. Of the 758 million illiterate adults in the world, 64% are women (UNESCO
Institute of Statistics 2016). In the developing world, it is mostly women who are
engaged in the most exploitative forms of work, receive the lowest wages or are
unpaid carers for the family. It has been said that women are the silent contributors
to the world’s economies—and the World Economic Forum (2015) estimates that
on current trends it will be 118 years before women can expect to receive the same
pay as men.

© The Author(s) 2018 93

C. Latchem, Open and Distance Non-formal Education in Developing Countries,
SpringerBriefs in Open and Distance Education,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-6741-9_10
94 10 Gender Equity

Providing more and better education for women not only creates a better life for
them and their families but also contributes to the well-being and economic pro-
ductivity of their communities. According to USAID (2015), when 10% more girls
go to school, on average a country’s GDP increases on by 3%; when girls stay in
school for seven or more years, they marry four years later and have two fewer
children; when women have the same amount of land as men, there is a more than
10% increase in crop yields; and when women’s share of seats in political bodies is
greater than 30%, the societies are more inclusive, egalitarian and democratic.
The provision of ODL NFE can help women and girls become literate and
numerate, develop their knowledge and skills in health care, childcare, nutrition,
hygiene and household and financial management, improve their employment and
self-employment prospects and by so doing, create equality between men and
women. Sadly, in some parts of the world, opening doors for girls’ schooling can be
dangerous.
Dr. Sakena Yacoobi is the CEO of the Afghan Institute of Learning (AIL), which
she founded in 1995 in response to the lack of education and health care that the
Afghan people were facing after decades of war and strife. Recognizing the plight
of girls in her native Afghanistan where armed groups were threatening their
education, Dr. Yacoobi abandoned an academic career in the USA to return home
to establish ‘underground schools’, teach 3,000 girls and train 80 women teachers
in innovative interactive and learner-centred methods. Since that time, AIL has
established 43 learning centres and six health clinics in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Established at the request of the local communities and run mainly by women, these
centres train teachers, provide schooling from pre-school to secondary level, health
education, income-generation workshops and safe havens for women. AIL’s Fast
Tracking Programme offers accelerated literacy, maths and enrichment classes for
older girls, enabling them to complete grades 1–3 in one year and then enter regular
schooling at 4th grade. It also enables married girls and women to continue with
their studies on an individualized basis and achieve 6th-, 9th- and 12th- grade
certification. It also provides classes in English, computing and ‘mobile literacy’
(literacy acquisition through texting). Every year AIL educates 22,000 primary and
secondary pupils, provides 141,000 women and girls with health education and
treats 228,000 health patients.
For more than twenty years, Dr. Sakena Yacoobi has risked her life to teach
women and children, and in the face of the oppressive Taliban regime, has used
education to reclaim Islam—believing that if people had access to the verses
themselves, they would see its underlying messages of peace, justice and equality.
When a group of armed Taliban invaded her school one day and the staff, terrified,
ran and locked themselves in an office, she invited the men into sit down for a cup
of tea, explaining to them that the Quran states that women have an equal right to
education and persuading them to leave the school in peace. Dr. Yacoobi has
received many awards for her leadership, bravery and humanity, including the 2015
Introduction 95

Qatar Foundation’s $500,000 WISE prize for taking education to disadvantaged

communities, the 2017 Sunhak Peace Prize and six honorary degrees.1
Another Afghan woman following a similar path is Razia Jan. She provides free
K-12 education at the Zabuli Education Centre in Deh’Subz, a village on the
outskirts of Kabul Province and adjacent Razia Jan Institute for more than 600 girls
from surrounding villages where there is a deep-seated stigma against females’
education. A few years ago, it would have been unimaginable that the menfolk in
this village would allow their daughters to go to school. Many of the pupils are the
first generation of girls to ever receive an education. The schools have fully
equipped computer rooms and science laboratories but have to be protected by high
stone walls and guards (Torgan 2016).2

Community Radio

While the mainstream and commercial media reinforce women’s traditional roles as
wives, mothers, homemakers and consumers, community radio is promoting gender
equality, empowering women, addressing issues relevant to their lives and inviting
them to share their stories on the airwaves. Community radio stations and NGOs are
also promoting the idea of women’s listeners’ clubs which convene in convenient
locations to listen to and discuss programmes on matters of common concern such
as early marriage, domestic violence, gaining greater economic independence or
having more say in community matters. Those women who have mobiles can also
interact with the stations and suggest ideas for future programmes.
Orlale (2015) described how the uneducated and largely illiterate members of 60
women’s listeners’ groups in villages in Kenya, supported by The Association of
Media Women in Kenya and the Ford Foundation, met twice a week, listened to the
community radio programmes and then debated topics such as gender-based vio-
lence, women’s economic empowerment and becoming involved in Kenya’s
devolved governance structure. The Ford Foundation then went on to establish a
digital resource centre and information hub in one of these villages. Equipped with
computers and Wi-fi, this enabled women of all ages to overcome the traditional
barriers to expression and opportunity, access information about government ser-
vices, participate in public debate, market their local products and hold their local
governments to account. As one woman remarked, ‘We have become powerful to
the point that no bills can be passed through the County Assembly without us being
consulted.’
Launched by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) in the Democratic
Republic of the Congo (DRC) in 2006 and in Niger in 2009, by 2012 the 1,000 FAO

1
See video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t0GqnNQ4fsE.
2
See video at https://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/29/opinion/pashtanas-lesson.html.
96 10 Gender Equity

Dimitra community listeners’ clubs3 had grown to have approximately 24,500

members and direct beneficiaries and 147,000 indirect beneficiaries. These listener
clubs have since spread to Burundi, Mauritania, Senegal and Ghana (FAO 2011).
They are equipped with wind-up or solar-powered radios and, in some cases,
solar-charged cell phones. Gender issues are integral to all their activities, and great
emphasis is placed on strengthening the visibility of women and their capacity to be
involved in decision-making. There are also some male members of these clubs, an
indication of recognition that men and women need to play an equal role in the
communities. The clubs operate in different ways according to their development
needs and circumstances, but the members always ensure that they are run demo-
cratically. The topics they consider include health, hygiene, sanitation, food security
and nutrition, agriculture and horticulture, fertilizers, warrantage (a credit system and
tool for food security), democracy, women’s access to land and water, education,
sexual/marital violence, early marriage of girls and other human rights issues. The
clubs maintain strong links with the local community radio stations, suggesting
topics for broadcasts which are then listened to live or recorded, discussed by the
club members and where necessary, acted upon (FAO, op cit).
In Niger, broadcasts and the actions of women’s listeners’ groups on topics such
as malaria and the benefits of giving birth in maternity centres rather than in the
home have led to improved health practices. These listener’s groups have also
managed to persuade rural councils to guarantee women the right to inherit land and
stand for election to local councils. In the Democratic Republic of Congo’s war-torn
South Kivu province, where an estimated 40 women were being raped every day,
Radio Bubusa, funded by the Health Unit of the German Agency for Technical
Cooperation and World Association for Christian Communication (WACC), was
founded by a group of rural women to improve their knowledge and practices in
health and rights issues. Programmes and discussions about sexual violence and
HIV/AIDS led to increased voluntary screening and more women seeking advice on
health matters. Elsewhere in the province, when fertile wetlands were threatened by
moves to introduce sugar cane farming, the local listeners’ groups persuaded the
authorities to discourage this move by levying a tax which caused 70% of the
wetlands to be returned to fruit growing. In another initiative in the DRC, a lis-
teners’ club set up a solidarity fund. Members of this fund, many of whom are
women, now make weekly contributions in cash or in kind, which gives them the
right to draw cash advances for medical expenses or family ceremonies such as
weddings, christenings and funerals. Also in the DRC, a women’s listeners club in
one village concluded that they needed to make the authorities more aware of the
links between corruption and sexual harassment. Taking advantage of a visit by a
group of influential officials, they decided to put on a play highlighting these issues.
When their menfolk refused to take on the roles of the ‘bad guys’, the women
dressed up as men and performed the sketch they had written, enacting the situa-
tions in which they found themselves on a daily basis. This prompted much

3
http://www.fao.org/dimitra/en/.
Community Radio 97

laughter but also served to heighten awareness of the seriousness of the issues
(FAO, op cit).4
Evaluations show that these listeners’ clubs change perceptions, behaviours and
practices in both men and women. They help the men gain a better understanding of
the women’s experiences, outlooks and lowly status, and they help the women gain
in self-confidence, play a more active role in community life and develop their
leadership capabilities. So successful has this approach proved to be that it has now
been adopted by other multilateral aid agencies including the United Nations
Population Fund, United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) and FAO’s
Emergency Units (FAO 2013).
Community radio can also ensure that women’s voices are heard in the public
sphere by training and employing them as station managers, programme producers,
presenters and reporters. In rural Senegal, World Education, with the support of
USAID and a local partner, ARLS (Association Rurale pour la Lutte Contra la
SIDA), has been running a Women’s Leadership and Civic Journalism programme
since 2010. Training women in community radio production and as
community-based correspondents and facilitators of listeners’ groups has met with
significant success. It has increased audiences and community involvement,
improved access to and responsiveness by local service providers and provided
more economic opportunities for women. One of the success stories of this venture
is that of a woman who attended school up until 8th grade, but whose mother then
died and whose father forced her into marriage with a man in another village, which
meant that she had to abandon her studies. Undeterred, she started to participate in
development projects around the village that was her new home and quickly gained
the respect and trust of the community. Impressed by her energy, attitude and
reputation in the village, World Education recruited her and provided her with
training in journalism, gender issues and starting up and running women’s listener
groups. Her subsequent radio broadcasts brought wider attention to the projects that
the women were undertaking in her village, making her even more popular in her
community. Today, she acts as a community health agent, manager of the health
kiosk, accountant for the local well management committee and an advocate for
women’s leadership (World Education 2012).
In 2011, the World Association of Community Radio Broadcasters (AMARC)
and Community Radio Broadcasters of Nepal (ACORAB) provided workshops,
individual mentoring and exposure to AMARC’s global broadcasting campaigns
for 51 women from the country’s community radio stations. The participants learnt
how to bring advocacy for equal access to the airwaves and promote women’s
participation in community decision-making. They also developed their location
and studio-based production skills and skills in researching and presenting
gender-related issues in ways that attracted, informed and involved mass audiences.
They participated in global broadcast campaigns on violence against women and
women’s role in sustainable development and climate change, and they took part in

4
See video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ixZOJd0b55w.
98 10 Gender Equity

broadcasts marking World Indigenous Day and World Food Day. They also formed
a nationwide network of women broadcasters to develop and apply the Gender
Policy for Community Radio in Nepal through their radio stations (ComDev Asia
2012).
Some community radio stations in India are run by women. Vyas (2015)
describes the work of four women managers of community radio stations in the
rural areas of Uttar Pradesh, Gujarat and Tamil Nadu. They ensure that they have a
finger on the pulse of their local communities by going from village to village
searching out news stories and issues for debate such as combating gender disparity
and exclusion, motivating women to recognize their abilities, stand up for their
rights and work for their communities and promoting women’s health and educa-
tion. They also produce programmes on controversial issues such as purdah, lack of
schooling for girls, child marriage, drug addiction and caste divide, using a mix of
interviews with experts, community members sharing their life experiences,
phone-ins, news magazines, quizzes, dramas and folk music.

Computer-Enabled Learning

Part of the work of the Broadband Commission for Digital Development5 which
was set up by the ITU and UNESCO in response to UN Secretary-General Ban
Ki-Moon’s calls for efforts to meet the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs)
involves redressing the inequalities faced by women and girls in terms of Internet
access and online content that reinforces social attitudes towards women. The
Commission has found that while gender gaps in Internet access are gradually
reducing in the majority of countries for which data are available, differences in the
percentage of men and women yet to go online are still significant and persistent
(Biggs and Zambrano 2013). Finding that women in developing countries experi-
ence multiple challenges in accessing and using computers and the Internet, a
number of international organizations are helping women to make greater and better
use of these tools for their personal benefit and in support of their communities.
It is important to focus on the uses of ICT that really appeal to the users. When
the Logged On Foundation6 in Nepal mounted a 15-day ICT course for women’s
cooperative and female teachers in Mayatari, 150 km from Kathmandu, it was
found that the family members of many of the participants were living far away and
even overseas. So it was decided to capture their interest in ICT by first familiar-
izing these women with Facebook Messenger and Skype. Then, having stimulated
these women’s interest and overcome their initial fears of the technology, they were
trained in Exel to improve the financial management of their cooperative, prepare
minutes and reports in MS Word and use email and in the case of the teachers,

5
http://www.broadbandcommission.org/about/Pages/default.aspx.
6
http://www.loggedon.org.au/.
Computer-Enabled Learning 99

using computers to prepare lesson plans, teaching and learning materials and
PowerPoint presentations (Logged On Foundation 2016).
Wamala (2012) describes a range of projects undertaken between 2007 and 2011
by The Swedish Programme for ICT in Developing Regions (Spider)7 which were
designed to empower women in Bolivia, Kenya, India and Rwanda. In Bolivia, the
indigenous peoples constitute approximately 62% of the population and another
30% of the population is of mixed European and indigenous ancestry. Like
indigenous peoples the world over, these groups struggle for recognition, respect
and improvements in their socio-economic and political circumstances. In 2009,
Spider and the Dutch International Institute for Communication and Development
(IICD) collaborated with the Confederation of Indigenous Peoples of Eastern
Bolivia to train 100 indigenous women in the use of computers and the Internet,
Word, Excel and Power Point, wikis, Skype, television and radio for the purposes
of advertising, campaigning, advocating and lobbying. Despite their limited edu-
cation and lack of previous knowledge and technical skills, these women proved to
be quite capable of mastering the technology and using it for political purposes,
helping other indigenous women to speak out on the issues of concern, obtaining
funding for small enterprises and in the case of several of the women, gaining
political positions at local, regional or national level.
Women who are victims of domestic violence are understandably reluctant to
attend meetings, air their problems publicly and confide in authorities. To overcome
this problem, another Spider and IICD project in Bolivia created six ‘virtual clinics’
offering women anonymous online help and advice. Again, a core group of 100
women was trained in the legal aspects of domestic abuse and how to use ICT for
developing audiovisual training materials, Web pages, blogs, and online forums on
domestic violence, self-esteem, human rights and gender equality. The resultant
virtual clinics gave women suffering physical and mental abuse knowledge of their
rights, a platform for debate and a sense of security and self-confidence.
In the Spider 2009–2010 Digital Baskets Project in the Kamonyi district in
Rwanda, female basket weavers were provided with laptops and digital cameras and
trained in digital photography, uploading pictures onto computers and writing
descriptive logs to provide an audiovisual record of their various basket-making
techniques. Again, despite a lack of education and experience with ICT, it was
found that these women were capable of creating a permanent record of their
indigenous skills which could then be used for the purposes of training and mar-
keting, again demonstrating that poorly educated remote rural women can master
ICT if it is applied to tasks relevant to their needs and lives. Further projects in
Tanzanua in 2011–2012 concerned ICT for mother and child health, SMS for
human rights and ICT for public access to cultural resources.8
Spider projects in Kenya, conducted in collaboration with Coastal Oceans
Research and Development in the Indian Ocean (CORDIO) and Avallain (a Swiss

7
http://spidercenter.org/.
8
See video at https://vimeo.com/126791121.
100 10 Gender Equity

social enterprise) and in India with the Suganthi Devadason Marine Research
Institute, focused on empowering and training women’s self-help groups in literacy
and numeracy, ICT, ecological sustainability and livelihood diversification in
coastal regions ecologically degraded by over-fishing (UNESCO 2012a). The
Kenyan project involved 90 women of all ages, many of whom were illiterate and
innumerate, plus a small number of men. Meeting twice weekly in study circles
with trained facilitators and using a mix of computer-based and face-to-face
methods, the participants developed their knowledge and skills in the areas under
consideration and were invited to discuss their livelihood options. Ideas for new
enterprises that they came up with included poultry farming and bee-keeping,
ecotourism, jewellery making and soap manufacturing. Following this project,
some of the women took charge of the village telecentres, securing renovated office
space, power supply and ICT facilities and paying for this by providing secretarial
services to the community; two women got jobs in the local marine research
centres; others embarked on small enterprises in soap, shampoo, cream and lotions
making, one of which was so successful that it began exporting its products to
Sweden.
Around 300 women participated in the Indian project. Like the Kenya project,
this involved facilitators of group meetings and a training-the-trainers approach.
Following the ICT and entrepreneurial skills training, some of the participants
gained employment as computer operators. Others successfully applied for loans
and started up small enterprises such as worm composting, sun drying fish,
dressmaking, bag making and manufacturing washing powder and toilet cleaning
agents. Yet others became involved in community development projects and local
politics.
Such initiatives are in line with the International Telecommunications Union
Resolution 70 REV. BUSAN 2014 (ITU 2014), ‘Mainstreaming a gender per-
spective in ITU and promotion of gender equality and the empowerment of women
through information and communication technologies’. This recognizes that society
as a whole will benefit from equal participation of women and men in
policy-making and decision-making and uses of ICT.

Mobile Learning

With the rapid rise in ownership and reducing costs of mobile phones with the
processing capabilities of the expensive laptops and desktops of only a few years
ago, there is growing interest in using these tools to empower women and girls,
provide them with literacy and other essential knowledge and skills and help them
improve their livelihoods and play a more central role in society.
Women are entering the field of politics and government in growing numbers,
but globally, they are still vastly underrepresented. In countries such as Afghanistan
and Iraq, women who are committed to building nascent democracies, exercising
their right to vote and running for office often do so at personal risk. However,
Mobile Learning 101

despite threats to their security, they are determined to help make life better for their
communities. In Iraq, the US Department of State’s Iraqi Women’s Democracy
Initiative has collaborated with local NGOs to train such women in leadership,
advocacy, political activism, conflict resolution, coalition building and constitu-
tional rights (Verveer 2010). Many of the women in, or aspiring to occupy, lead-
ership positions live far from each other and sometimes in remote areas.
Recognizing the need for covert communications in helping these women, the
non-profit branch of the technology company Souktel9 and international aid agency
Mercy Corps10 devised the mobile phone-based Civic Education Information
Service for Female Iraqi Leaders. Using a special platform called PeerNet which
any mobile user authorized by Mercy Corps could access regardless of their mobile
network, the leaders of local women’s groups were able to develop a network and
use SMS to share information and solve problems in total confidence. There was no
registration fee for using this system; incoming text messages were free, and out-
going text messages cost only 5 US cents. Forty Iraqi women leaders from a range
of backgrounds participated in the nine-month Civic Education programme. To be
eligible to participate, they had to be literate in Arabic and already responsible for
running community organizations with links to local and provincial policy-makers.
On completing their training, these women agreed to collaborate on a national
public education campaign on women’s rights in which each of them would make
contact with at least 300 members of their local community, a further 1,200 indi-
viduals through the media and 15 policy-makers. They were each given USD 1,000
for implementing advocacy and awareness activities of their own choosing such as
public information campaigns or women’s rights training. The PeerNet technology
allowed the users to create labelled mailing lists and contact many other women
simultaneously with a confidential single text message for the purposes of training,
mentoring and organizing follow-up events. Despite these women’s isolation, an
unstable security situation and the prevailing male-dominated cultural norms, this
programme succeeded in increasing the women’s understanding of democratic
governance and empowered and enabled them to further engage in the political and
social spheres (UNESCO 2012b).
Another women’s leadership initiative involving mobile phones was the ‘Pink
Phone’ project which was conducted in three provinces in Cambodia. Launched in
2010, this project was part of the Women’s Economic Leadership Programme for
village women supported by Women for Prosperity (WfP), Oxfam GB and
Metfone. It was designed to empower and train women to participate in commune
councils, the first level of government in Cambodia, all of which must have at least
one woman member. Forty-five female councillors were trained to undertake this
role in which they had to be the first point of contact for villagers on matters such as
health, violence or the quality of schooling and be mediators between their local
communities and the relevant government departments. Their training was provided

9
http://www.souktel.org/.
10
https://www.mercycorps.org/.
102 10 Gender Equity

by a mix of classroom presentations, role plays, group discussions and games in

leadership, facilitation and mediation skills, identifying and resolving problems,
planning, finance and report-making.
The female leaders and small producers were also trained in, and through the use
of, the mobile phone. In Cambodia, mobiles are typically shared within families or
owned by husbands, so in order to carry out their duties these women councillors
had to have their own phones. These phones were coloured pink so that if any man
was seen with one, it would be immediately known that he had taken it from one of
these women. Before they could learn how to use the mobile phone and SMS, some
of the women had to be taught how to read and write in Khmer. This is no easy
matter since this involves navigating several menus on the phone and takes several
clicks to send even the simplest message. However, the women managed to master
the technology and use their pink phones to carry out their duties much more
effectively and speedily, provide villagers with important information such as
current commodity and trading prices and storm warnings and seek assistance and
advice on their behalf. With the expansion of the programme, and demand from
other women involved in leadership positions and community work, the pink
mobiles were issued to many other women. Evaluations revealed a number of
positive outcomes from this project. The use of the mobile phones extended support
to women in vulnerable situations in the community. It improved the women’s
work, time management, communication and decision-making skills. It encouraged
women to step outside their traditional role as housewives and engage in social and
political issues. It led to increased discussion on gender roles and greater com-
munity acceptance of the idea of women as leaders. It contributed to lower crime
rates and improved access to health, educational and emergency services.
Observing how useful mobiles could be to business operations, other women started
saving up to buy their own devices. And as a consequence of all this, the women
became more self-confident and began to receive more respect from their husbands
and other males (UNESCO 2016).
There are other examples of mobile learning benefitting women throughout this
book. Women clearly appreciate the value of mobile phones, and there is little
evidence of female technophobia. However, social norms adversely influence
women’s access to and use of mobile technology. Over 1.7 billion females in the
low- and middle-income countries still do not own mobile phones, and women on
average are 14% less likely to own a mobile phone than men. And even when
women do own mobile phones, there is a significant gender gap in mobile phone
usage which prevents them from reaping the full benefits of mobile phone
ownership. Cost is the greatest barrier because women often have less financial
independence than men (Santosham et al 2016).
Conclusion 103

Conclusion

This chapter and other cases throughout the book describe programmes that suc-
cessfully use ODL and ICT to expand and improve educational opportunities for
women in developing countries where gender inequities are most severe. But
technology alone cannot provide all the answers. It needs to be used as part of a
holistic strategy that tackles gender discrimination, poverty and all of the barriers
that limit the role of females in society. Economist Amartya Sen (1999) considers
‘development’ as a process of expanding freedoms equally for all—male and
female. Empowering women and girls and granting them more freedoms is the
responsibility of all members of society. And it can never be assumed that men and
women share the same life experiences upon which to base their learning, or that
male and female learners have the same levels of literacy, technical skills or access
to ICT. Bentley and Bentley (2012) provide a useful reminder that sensitivity to
gender issues is essential in designing and delivering ODL. For example,
cybercafés tend to benefit men far more than women because it is the male members
of families who have the freedom to go to them and the money to spend in them.
Gender differences in the use of technology also need to be taken into account.
Analysing men and women’s use of ICT in 25 Latin American and African
countries representing different levels of development, geography, culture and
social structure, Hilbert (2011) concluded that women make less frequent and less
intense use of the Internet than men and are more likely to use it for instant
messaging, chat rooms and education and training, while the men are more likely to
use it for downloading games, music and other forms of entertainment. There is also
research that suggests that general, males like the Internet for the experiences it
offers, while women like it for the human connections it makes possible. Care is
also needed to avoid gender bias in the learning design and gender stereotyping in
the wording, illustrations, cases and examples in the courseware. Some gender
issues may be fairly obvious, such as the use of exclusionary language. But it also
needs to be remembered that men and boys tend to ‘state the facts’ and favour
non-fiction, action and adventure, while women tend to look for an interconnect-
edness of ideas and favour narrative forms of discourse. So designing ODL NFE
programmes intended to promote gender equity need to start with analysing the
disparities in roles, behaviours, activities and perceptions of the female members of
society, investigating why such disparities exist, whether or not they are detrimental
and limit women’s and men’s capacities, and, if so, how they can be remedied.

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