Bush Not Making the Grade on Education Pledge to Central America

By Michael Lisman and Megan Fletcher
South Florida Sun-Sentinel, March 22, 2008

This time last year, as President Bush returned from his first visit to Central America, he addressed the nation on the "new direction" of U.S. foreign aid to a region many consider neglected.

"This is an important speech for me," he declared in his March 5 address, which drew comparisons to President Kennedy's Alliance for Progress speech. Bush cited education as "the most basic need" for progress today in the poorest group of countries in the hemisphere. He warned that if "these children don't learn how to read, write, add and subtract, they'll be shut off from the jobs of the 21st century" and "be condemned to a life on the margins — and that's not acceptable."

Specifically, he promised that more U.S. aid would be channeled to education projects through a new U.S.-Latin America policy focus on the region's "social agenda."

Yet today, one year later, U.S. commitment to education in Central America is declining. Rather than backing new programs to raise the quality of primary and secondary schools in the region, the president and Congress approved a fiscal year 2008 budget that cuts bilateral aid for education in Central America by 30 percent. Only 6 percent of total U.S. foreign aid to Central America this year is slated for education assistance. Of this meager sum, much is spent on scholarships for university study in the United States — a worthy diplomacy tool, but hardly education aid. All this suggests that our new social agenda is still more rhetoric than reality.

By any measure, the opportunity to eke out a decent living in these countries is extremely bleak — and it is clear the lack of educational opportunity is at the heart of this poverty. High school enrollment in Central America is below 50 percent, and access to college remains only for the elite. Illiteracy rates are as high as 35 percent in Guatemala. Heading north is the most obvious alternative to a life of crime or poverty; nearly 10 percent of the region's population currently lives and works in the United States. Notably, polls of these recent immigrants to the United States consistently show that decent education for their children is their number one concern.

Though hard-pressed to raise their own education budgets of roughly $300 per student per year, the leaders of the Central American countries themselves are starting to come together for change. Three months ago, the presidents of Central America signed a regional pact (the Education Decalogue 2021), committing their governments to unprecedented reforms in education policy, including merit pay for teachers, universal preschool and first-rate comprehensive learning standards.

The challenges and the goals have become clear, and the United States has a number of immediate and high-impact opportunities to help. The president and Congress can exercise leadership to make the following happen in 2008:

• Pass the 2007 Education for All Act (H.R. 2092/S. 1259), which commits billions of dollars to helping developing countries around the world reach the Millennium Development Goal of universal primary education by 2015. Central American governments signed onto the Education Decalogue would be the principal recipients of these funds in the Western Hemisphere.

• Pass the newly revamped Social Investment and Economic Development Fund for the Americas (H.R. 3692/S. 2120), which will commit up to $2.5 billion expressly for social and economic development aims across the whole of Latin America, and fund cross-sectoral aims in education, health and economic readiness.

• Expand the Millennium Challenge Corporation, which currently spends nearly $1 billion in Honduras, Nicaragua and El Salvador on innovative, "results-based" aid in other sectors. Through the creation of a new education quality indicator, the MCC should challenge governments to boost learning levels, literacy and secondary graduation rates as well as improving economic and market infrastructure, as it does now.

Today, one-third of Central America's population is 15 years old or younger, and their future is at stake. There is a lot to do, but now is the crucial moment for the president and Congress, as the House Foreign Affairs Committee recently wrote in an open letter to "send the right message" to our closest neighbors, and fulfill our promise for helping to create a better, more prosperous neighborhood.

Michael C. Lisman is PREAL coordinator for Central America, and Megan Fletcher is program associate for legislative affairs at the Inter-American Dialogue in Washington, D.C.

Copyright © 2008, South Florida Sun-Sentinel