Proponents of basic education in Nigeria have reiterated the need for scaling up awareness on girl-child education in Adamawa State.
They also called on the government to view girl-child education as an empowerment programme due to the low level of girl-child education in the state.
The calls were made at a one-day sub-national summit on girl-child education in Yola, the Adamawa State capital.
The summit was organised by the African Centre for Leadership, Strategy and Development (CentreLSD) in partnership with Malala Fund.
Government officials, traditional leaders from Numan, Song and Maiha local government areas (LGAs), members of the academia, education administrators, students, officials of civil society organisations and the media attended the summit.
‘Education is a major bedrock for the development of any nation; therefore, girl-child education must be prioritised to ensure the development of the society’, the basic education advocates said in a communique to Development Diaries.
‘Girl-child education has a direct correlation to the 17 items of the sustainable development goals (SDGs). Therefore, a high rate of educated female population will ultimately lead achievement of the SDGs and vice versa.
‘There is still a wide gender gap in education that must be addressed: Whereas the national gender demography is almost 50–50, the gender gap in education is still very wide’.
The communique also noted that increased education for the girl-child makes women better members of society, better daughters, responsible mothers and wives and makes the household less prone to poverty.
According to a 2021 performance evaluation report conducted by the Federal Ministry of Education in collaboration with the United Nations Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF), at least 12 million children are out of school in Nigeria.
Figures from the UN agency show that 69 percent of these children are in Nigeria’s northern region, and 60 percent of them are girls.
A 2020 baseline survey conducted by CentreLSD in Adamawa State shows that about 886,634 of Adamawa’s children were out of school, with 51 percent of girls of school age out of school.
To address these issues, CentreLSD and Malala Fund launched a three-year Community-led Collective Action for Girl Education (C-CAGE) in 2020 to strengthen systems and cultural norms that encourage girl-child enrollment and retention in public primary and secondary schools in Adamawa’s Song, Numan, and Maiha LGA.
The project, according to CentreLSD, has since returned 1,451 girls to school in Adamawa and established over 15 safe spaces for girls to learn basic numeracy and vocational skills.
However, CentreLSD, in the communique, noted that girls’ education should not just be about enrollment but should also extend to encouraging them to put in their best while in school.
The joint UNICEF and Nigerian Education ministry report revealed that about 50 percent of in-school children are not learning as expected, and therefore cannot read or write; while approximately 63 percent of children who live in rural areas cannot read at all and, similarly, around 84 percent of children in the lowest economic quartile also cannot read at all.
It is understood that the C-CAGE documentary, with the theme ‘Girl Child Education: A Veritable Tool for Development’, was premiered at the summit.
Photo source: UN Women