Page 489 - El État de los derechos humanos en el desarrollo sostenible

EL ETAT DE LOS DERECHOS HUMANOS EN EL DESARROLLO SOSTENIBLE

Education
Only men had a say and thought that schooling was not important for girls who would any

how get married and then become housewife. To learn something else would be just a waste

of time, they thought. No girl could therefore study something, and even if she did

occasionally, she was not able to apply her knowledge because her job after marriage was
confined to the kitchen stove. Others thought that, if both boys and girls were to go to

school together, the boys would be distracted from learning by the beauty of the girls and

would then think about love and marriage rather than knowledge and this would not be
good for society.

45% of Cambodian women were reported as being illiterate in 2004. 16% of Cambodian

girls were enrolled in lower secondary schools in 2004. Many Cambodian girls have been

kept from education due to several factors. One factor is that they are needed at home to
take care of younger siblings, perform household duties, and support the head of the home.

Other factors include extreme poverty, the prohibitive distance of schools from many rural

houses, and sometimes even fears for their safety when traveling alone from home to school.
Women are increasingly present in Cambodia's universities. As of 2004, 20% of graduates

from universities were female.[1]

Luckily, this time is now behind us. In modern, technological society and its new thinking,

both boys and girls go to school. Men and women have nowadays the same rights and

freedoms, and also their labor has the same value. Unfortunately, this modern concept is not
yet accepted in all parts of the country, particularly in rural areas where old traditions still

prevail. Here you find that “women still belong near the kitchen stove”.[2]

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