The benefits of education are well known: Education is the key to improve livelihoods, healthcare, nutrition and the exercise of civil and political rights. Ideally, education includes all forms of schooling. At their best, Colleges can be safe spaces where young people can forge identities, clarify values and develop critical thinking skills, while also learning to exercise their rights. Even though education begins before and goes beyond schooling, a new paradigm of ‘life-long learning’ in the colleges, emphasizes the transformative synergies that can occur between educational institutes, family, community and cultural experiences. It encompasses the acquisition of relevant capacities – the knowledge, marketable skills, social capital and values that enable individuals to function effectively in a range of adult roles, including worker, household provider, parent, spouse, family caretaker, citizen and community participant.
