ABSTRACT
The importance attributed to education in recent years in the whole world made the 1990s the Decade of Education, as declared by the World Conference on “Education for All” held in Jomtien, Thailand, in 1990. The results of a more serious social and economic investment in the area, in the various Latin American and Caribbean countries, can already be evaluated through the improvements observed in recent years in the gross enrolment ratios at the three levels of schooling, and the adult literacy rates, as shown by the HDI Reports (PNUD, 1999). An increase in the gross enrolment ratios in programmes of early childhood care and education/development has also been observed around the world, and in particular in Latin America, during the last decade, as recently shown by Robert Myers (2000) when evaluating the effects of the Conference on Education for All on Early Childcare and Development (ECCD) programmes (Table 7.7).
