Paper long abstract:

Education has both instrumentalist and utilitarian values. For individuals, quality education offers opportunities for personal development through knowledge and skills acquisition besides enjoyment of more freedoms. For societies, socio-economic and political progress are underpinned by the quality and quantity of education their members receive. Indeed Amartya Sen underscores the role of education in development, which he defines as the process of growing out of the shackles of unfreedoms. On the other hand, Paul Romer attributes country-level variations in the levels of development to among other factors, the quality of education received by the nationals of the respective countries. The fact that personal, societal and national development depends on education makes its core value to be a public good to which everyone is entitled. Indeed Article 26 of the 1948 United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights proclaims the right of all persons to education. Articles 28 & 29 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) obligate the state to guarantee this right. Articles 43 (1) (f) and 53 (1) (b), of Kenya's Constitution place the obligation of providing education as a human right on the state. Against this background it is easy to discern that education is everybody's business. The important question, however, is how "everyone" participates in ensuring that quality education is received by all who need it in the light of the hierarchical systems that deliver it. This paper shares one organization's 11 years' experience of using evidence-based community, public and policy engagement and advocacy, to bridge the information as well as policy-practice gaps among the key actors in promoting equitable access to quality basic education in Kenya. The paper highlights the challenges, lessons learnt and what the organization sees as the unfinished business if equitable access to quality learning is to be guaranteed for all children in Kenya.

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