How can policies and practices better promote women’s leadership in Tanzania’s education system?

Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 5 calls for full and effective participation of women and equal opportunities at all levels of decisionmaking. Yet as we approach the midpoint of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, women continue to face a gender gap in power and leadership positions. Globally, women hold just 27% of seats in parliament and 36% in local government and make up only 28% of workplace managers. Particularly, in the education system, women are also still underrepresented in leadership positions.

The African Union’s Agenda 2063 envisages a continent where women hold at least 50% of elected public offices and leadership positions across public and private sectors. However, despite these ambitious goals, women—who constitute over 60% of the East African Community (EAC) population—continue to be excluded from leadership due to ongoing social, economic, cultural, and political marginalization. The Global Gender Gap Report 2024 indicates gaps in economic participation and opportunity with all East African countries scoring less than 1 in this category (with the highest score being 7). On advancement of women to leadership roles, most EAC countries also fell short: Tanzania (4.82), Kenya (4.44), Rwanda (5.69), and Uganda (4.71).  

This marginalization is particularly evident in education systems. In most African countries, despite comprising most of the teaching staff, women are underrepresented in leadership roles. Administrative data from six African countries shows that the share of women among primary school leaders varies from 9% to 21%  Yet, school is often the first formal space where children—girls and boys—develop their ambitions and aspirations, get mentorship, and encounter women as role models in leadership. In fact, the Continental Education Strategy for Africa (CESA) 2062 emphasizes the need for gender equitable leadership, identifying the percentage of female head teachers as one of its indicators of progress. Researchers have shown that schools with female heads influence parental engagement in their children education, reduce stereotypes, and reduce the educational attainment gender gap. These contribute to reduction of school dropout.

Through my own work over the past decade with Campaign for Female Education (CAMFED)  in Tanzania, Malawi, Ghana, Zimbabwe, and Zambia, I have witnessed firsthand the important roles women school leaders play in promoting access, retention, progress and learning through education. CAMFED has seen women leaders – of parent groups, school committees and boards, heads of school, teacher mentors as well as young women graduates – champion the implementation of education policies such as school reentry for those who are pushed out of education systems due to poverty, teenage pregnancy, and other vulnerabilities as well as transforming gender and social norms.

Seeing and experiencing the full range of women’s abilities in school can also help challenge and break gender stereotypes. Through its Learner Guide program, for example, CAMFED engages young women school graduates to bring their lived experience to schools and support the education journeys of the next generation. Being a Learner Guide can serve as a pathway into the teaching profession, thereby contributing to the female leadership pipeline in education. Learner Guides are often the only female role models in schools, particularly in rural areas, where most teachers are male. Additionally, CAMFED works with female teachers in schools to build their skills and support them in stepping up as key education leaders.

Despite efforts like these, the number of women holding formal leadership roles in Tanzanian schools and district and regional education offices remains low. A preliminary analysis of data I collected from 493 secondary schools in Tanzania this spring reveals that on average women represent only 19% of heads of school in rural areas and only 36% in urban and suburban areas. Furthermore, as head teachers often advance to roles such as ward education officers, district education officers, and regional administrators, these positions also reflect a similar gender imbalance with women facing barriers to accessing these career paths. What is holding women back?

As a 2024 Echidna Global Scholar, I am exploring pathways into educational leadership in Tanzania, with the goal of deepening our understanding of the root causes of the gender imbalance in leadership roles in Tanzania’s education system. The findings will support the development of policy recommendations and inform actions in the education system to close the gender gap in female leadership and take an important step forward in ensuring gender transformative education for all students.