Improving education data to count minority girls in Peru

Afro Peruvians, a minority group roughly 8 percent of the population of Peru, has been invisible in modern government policy for two reasons. First, ethnicity is defined by language groups and, therefore, subsumes Afro Peruvians into the Spanish-speaking population. Second, the government has been focused on the indigenous population as the most vulnerable while neglecting other minority groups. This discrimination is magnified for Afro Peruvian girls as ethnicity, poverty, and gender intersect and affect their right to…