Noting that girls' lack of access to education is related to a number of economic, social, religious, and cultural factors as well as a scarcity of places in schools and that promoting gender equity in school may help equity spread throughout the entire community, this report illustrates the gender equity approach used in the Save the Children's basic education programs. The report highlights how investing in girls' education can enhance girls' productivity, and later access to credit, civic involvement, and childrearing practices. Also discussed in the report are community-based strategies that support girls' education, in the areas of enrollment, persistence, learning enhancement, and reform between Save the Children and its partners. Strategies to promote enrollment include establishing new schools, agreeing on gender parity as a condition of beginning a school, and raising community awareness of the benefits of girls' education. Strategies to promote persistence of school attendance include establishing local systems of monitoring and addressing girls' absence, offering scholarships or other incentives, altering school schedules, and employing female teachers and others. Strategies to enhance learning include developing early childhood opportunities and training teachers to use techniques that view every student as an individual, active learner. Strategies to promote reform among Save the Children and partners include experimenting with cost sharing formulae and supporting partnerships to bring paraprofessional and parent elements into provision of basic education. (Contains 13 endnotes.) (KB)