Guatemala PRONADE
Meeting Education for All
In the late 1990s and early 2000s the Guatemalan education system was failing. More than six million adults—those age 15 and higher—were illiterate with an annual increase of approximately 83,000 according to Fernando Rubio. The majority of this new illiterate population was made up of children who did not have access to education. Primary education in Guatemala is geared towards children aged 7-12, and to the government’s credit, concerted efforts to reach targets set under the Peace Accords, have helped increase enrollment in primary education by approximately 26 percent from 1996 to 2000—half of this increase was a result of enrollment in Guatemala’s Programa Nacional de Autogestión para el Desarrollo Educativo (PRONADE) program. The program has empowered isolated rural communities to administer and manage schools, and the number of hard to reach children who now have access to education has more than tripled. is case study examines the impact of PRONADE community schools in Guatemala from 1996 to 2005.