It has been observed that, despite the urgency of educational improvements, Nigeria is failing to make sufficient progress at a sufficient rate.
The observation was contained in a presentation titled ‘Realities of OOSC in Nigeria: What is Working’ by Abdurrahman Ibrahim Ado Education Specialist, UNICEF Bauchi Field Office, at the opening of a two-day Regional Stakeholders Engagement Meeting on out-of-School Children and the Retention, Transition and Completion Models in Bauchi, Gombe and Adamawa states at Emerald Hotel Hall, Gombe, Gombe State.
He stressed that 1 in 3 children are OOS in Nigeria, more than 18 million total across Primary and Junior Secondary levels alone, which account for more than 15% of global OOS children and well over half of the OOSC in the region of West and Central Africa.
The Education Specialist added that the rate, though decreasing, is not keeping pace with the growing population, stressing that at the primary level, the majority of OOS children are those who never attended, but at the junior and upper secondary level, dropout becomes a much more significant challenge.
Abdurrahman Ibrahim Ado also said that National Commission for Almajiri and Out-of-School Children Education established government- and donor-driven interventions such as Better Education Service Delivery for All (BESDA), Alternate School Programmes (ASP), Open Schooling Programmes (OSP) and Opportunities to Learn (OTL)
He added that there was approval of the Accelerated Basic Education Curriculum targeted at educational organisation, structuring, curriculum design and mainstream schooling, especially for nomadic, almajiri, and boy-child education.
He also pointed at the establishment of community learning hubs with the support of local civil society groups and development partners to enhance catch-up learning in literacy and numeracy, taught in the local languages of the communities School feeding initiatives and conditional cash transfers to vulnerable families.
Furthermore, there was the creation of role models through the Female Teachers Trainee Scholarship Scheme.
Community engagement identifies and addresses barriers to education such as poverty, cultural norms, and a lack of infrastructure.
Community engagement initiatives include community outreach programmes, partnerships with CSOs and grassroots organisations, SBMC and parental involvement, mentoring and tutoring programmes, cultural sensitivity, advocacy, and policy influence.
According to him, “From our programming, we have learned much about what works to increase access and improve learning outcomes to facilitate retention and transition. We have seen that. Ongoing efforts to strengthen and integrate data systems, including EMIS and TMIS, have supported equitable resource allocation.”
He also said that “mapping OOS children in some states has enabled targeted support to reach those most in need. We have also seen that strengthening coordination mechanisms at the federal and state levels enables a more effective response to the needs and rights of Almajiri children, namely in the northern states.”
The UNICEF Education Specialist further said, Similarly, strengthened state and LGA coordination enables the monitoring of the effectiveness of interventions to support Islamiyya, Quranic, and Tsangaya education.”
According to him, “the development of a national enrolment drive framework, paired with quality ECE, engagement of parents, and enrolment campaigns, has been effective in increasing on-time enrolment.”
He also disclosed that UNICEF supported more than 40,000 beneficiaries with cash transfers, stressing that when paired with clear communication on the importance of using the transfers for schooling, these efforts have been effective, as most households used the money to buy school materials.”
“From GEP 3 evaluation specifically, we have seen that comprehensive approaches to addressing both access and learning quality are effective (such as cash transfers paired with efforts to strengthen teachers’ capacity) Community engagement and evidence-based advocacy, especially collaboration and partnerships with religious and community leaders, have been effective in identifying priorities to address OOS and raising local commitment to the programme,” he added.
Abdurrahman Ibrahim Ado added that,
“Moreover, the significant disparities within the country mean that increased investment must be paired with evidence-based and equity-focused decision-making to implement targeted policies and interventions to reach the farthest behind.”
He stressed that in Nigeria, the farthest behind are more than 26% of the OOS children who are in the North-East and 40% who are in the North-West.”
According to him, “These proportions are notably higher than the just 2% of the country’s OOS population that lives in the Southeast, 6% in the South, and 8% in the South West.”
“Moreover, the highest proportion of OOS children, more than half, are concentrated in just 8 states, making state-level investment based on need critical to addressing the OOS challenge,” he added.
The education specialist added that, “Moreover, reaching these children will require adequate attention to the intersecting vulnerabilities that disadvantage them. Business as usual is not only an inadequate approach because it fails to drive adequate economic improvement but also because it continues to fail to reach children who are the farthest behind, especially children in rural areas, who account for more than 85% of the OOS children.”
“This proportion is even higher at the primary level, where 9 out of 10 OOS children are from rural areas,” he concluded.
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