No fewer than 1.4 million girls in the northern part of Nigeria have been able to access pre-primary and Integrated Qur’anic education through the Girl-Child Education (GEP3) project in 10 years.
This was disclosed by chief of field office, United Nations Children Fund (UNICEF) in Bauchi State, Dr Tushar Rane, during a three-day media Dialogue on Girls Education, which was held at the Chartwell Hotel in Bauchi, yesterday.
Rane pointed out that the education of the girl child is critical to transforming communities, reducing inequalities, and strengthening economies.
He said the GEP3 initiative was designed to enhance the enrollment drive for girls, improve learning outcomes for girls and strengthen government’s policy making for continued support to girl child education.
The project was implemented in six states in northern Nigeria including Bauchi, Kano, Katsina, Niger, Sokoto and Zamfara.
He said the GEP3 project is funded by the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) of the UK with focus on the UNICEF Girl Education Project Phase 3, (GEP3) supported by the Foreign and Commonwealth Development Office (FCDO) of the United Kingdom (UK).
“In Bauchi State, for example, through the Girls’ Education Project3 (GEP3) funded by the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) of the UK, the project effectively increased the enrollment of girls with a total of 650,265 girls enrolled into pre-primary and Integrated Qur’anic Education.
“The Girl4Girl and HeForShe activities of the project empowered about 9,000 girls and boys in Bauchi State to use peer support mechanism to create demand for girl child enrollment in their communities. Strengthening the capacity of teachers is crucial for the retention of girl children who enroll in schools.
“The GEP3 project implemented various capacity building initiatives for teachers while a total of 11,000 teachers have received training on topics such as leadership skills to enable effective running of schools, Early Grade Reading pedagogies to enable early grasp of literacy skills and other key topics essential for effective service delivery,” he said.
He said, “When we educate the girl child, child marriage and child mortality rates reduce. The situation with girls’ education has been worsened by attacks on schools which have made the learning environment insecure and discouraged parents and caregivers from sending their wards, particularly girls, to schools.”
Rane said, with funding support from development partners, they are collaborating with the government to build the capacity of school-based management committees (SBMCs) and community-based management committees (CBMCs) on school safety and security, and to make communities more resilient.
He said, the project successfully strengthened school governance systems through the facilitation of eight annual school census, strengthening school record keeping, developing local education sector operational plan to align with the state education sector plan, and improving the functionality of SBMCs and CBMCs.
