‘We too can be great’

How return of girls to schools has changed lives in Abuja community In Jibi Deidei, an Abuja community, an intervention programme by a non-profit organisation has seen girl dropouts returning to school and transforming their lives and the community as our reporter observed. The number of out-of-school children across the world continues to be high […]

• How return of girls to schools has changed lives in Abuja community

In Jibi Deidei, an Abuja community, an intervention programme by a non-profit organisation has seen girl dropouts returning to school and transforming their lives and the community as our reporter observed.

The number of out-of-school children across the world continues to be high despite many thinking the number would reduce with time. More alarming is the number of out-of-school girls across the world, with Nigeria leading the way globally.

The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) reported that more than 130 million girls between the ages of six and 17 across the globe are out of school. Fifteen million girls of primary-school age, with half of them in Sub-Sahara Africa, will never enter a classroom, as poverty remains the most important factor for determining whether a girl gets to access education.

The result of a survey conducted by the United Nations Children Fund (UNICEF) also indicated that the population of out-of-school children in Nigeria has risen to 13.2 million from the initial 10.5 million, the highest in the world with the number of girls also higher than that of boys.

Educating the girl-child refers to every aspect of education that aims at developing the skill and knowledge of girls and women which includes the general education at colleges, schools, professional education, technical and vocational educations, health education, and others. It is stated to encompass both non-literary and literary education.

Every part of the country is affected including Nigeria’s Federal Capital Territory (FCT) where some people may think it is all rosy. But most affected is the northern region due to insurgency, which has ravaged the area in recent times.

Some of the factors militating against the girl-child education include: poor family background, religious isolation, disability, early marriage and pregnancy, gender-driven violence, cultural discrimination and attitudes against women’s status and role, amongst others.

But some communities are changing the narrative by given more support to their girl-children by enrolling them in schools, just like the boys.

At Jibi, a community in Bwari Area Council of the FCT, consisting of mostly farmers, traders and low-income earners, most of the girls have not attended school, or have dropped out to get married or engage in hawking to support their families.

However, a recent intervention by Non-profit organization along with the support of the community is trying to get most of the girls back in school, while also teaching them skills to support their education.

For instance, eight years ago at the age of 15, Fatimah Ahmed dropped out of school in JSS 3 to get married. She has recently re-enrolled in school under the Mercy Corps project codenamed: “Educating Nigerian Girls in New Enterprises (ENGINE II)”, which was sponsored by the UK’s Department for International Development (DFID).

The project is aimed at improving learning of in-school and out-of-school girls and their transition to higher level education or other income-generating opportunities.

Her return to school has changed her perspective on life, Fatima said, including how she planned to raise her daughters.

“We have learnt so much at the Centre on financial education, literacy, numerals and others and through that, I have been able to learn how to plan, set my goals and achieve them,” she said.

The 23-year-old mother of three said, “My understanding of girl-child education has been broadened.”

Her plans had been to raise her two daughters to a suitable age before giving them out in marriage.

“But with what I have learnt and come to understand, I’m determined to make sure my girls have equal access to education the same way my son will.

“When I stopped going to school, it did not bother my parents because my parents thought girls’ education didn’t really matter. Their belief was that it was only the boys that can go to school and become somebody great in life; that no matter how you educate a girl, the end point is that she will go and marry,” she said.

Fatima enjoys the support of her husband in her efforts to return to school. He encouraged her to enrol and helps out with the children so she could attend classes.

“He said if I am educated, I can be a great woman and also contribute my quota to the family and the country,” she said.

For Hauwa Ahmed (not related), 19, her reasons for dropping out of school are slightly different from Fatima’s.

“I dropped out of school because my parents have no money and it was becoming difficult so, I decided to be hawking so that I can support them,” she said.

When Mercy Corps brought the project to their community about three years ago, it gave her an opportunity to return to school in time to write the 2019 Senior Secondary School Certificate examinations (SSCE).

This means that her dreams of becoming a doctor in the future is still alive but in the meantime, she has earned a grant for her business so that finance wouldn’t be an issue for her education.

“I started selling charcoal from the first five bags given to me but it has now increased. Now, I buy pick-up (vehicle) load containing 40 bags. This is because I have learnt how to do my business better, how to manage and also save money, how to control my lifestyle because I now know my needs from my wants,” she noted.

For girls hawking in Jibi community, it is no fault of theirs but their parents, said Hadiza Saleh, another 19-years-old girl of the Centre who has been part of the progamme for over three years now.

“If parents support their girls, they don’t have any choice but to go to school but many parents don’t even advise their girls while some want them to go into trade because they believe education for woman will end at her husband’s house. They believe that only boys can make them proud. Because of this, I lost interest in education at a tender age until my orientation changed when this programme came into the community,” she said.

Hadiza, who prides herself on her ability to read and write, says she is also happy her parents’ orientation on girl-child education has changed and they are now supporting her education.

The Programme Director, ENGINE II, Mercy Corps in Nigeria, Mrs Joy Aderele said the implementation of adolescent girls’ education is actually targeting both girls that are in school and those that are out of school.

“For the in-school girls, the aim is to support them and add to their subject areas by providing extra tutorial so that they will be able to complete their cycle of education, their cycle of education being secondary education. This is because research has shown that, if a girl completes her secondary education, she will earn four times higher than the girl who didn’t.”

She also said beyond income is her general well-being adding that if a girl is educated, she will be able to make better choices, she will be able to delay marriage and childbirth and all those indicators that contribute to her well-being.

“So, we are implementing this program for girls that are in-school and out of school to enable them to complete their education. We are working towards retention and completion.

“We are supporting them to return to school because education is very key, education is the tool for development. We are supporting their livelihoods. So, we are not giving them fish, we are teaching them how to fish,” she said.

Mrs Aderele said sustainability has been built into this programme from scratch, while adding that the three major outcomes of ENGINE II was on “Learning” – ensuring the girls learn, on “Transition” –  the progress from one phase to the other and the third one is “Sustainability”.

“We are also working with the Government of Nigeria and its different line agencies to make sure we get good results on issues relating to girl-child education,” she said.

The community women leader in Jibi Deidei, Hajia Hauwa’u Muhammad said since the girls have started going to school, there are lots of changes in their attitudes, relationship with the opposite sex, as they can now read and write.

“Before they have language barrier but we are proud of them now the way they speak English,” she said.

She said she goes from house-to-house to encourage the girls especially those that are absent because she visits the learning Centre from time to time to take records of participants and find out the reason behind their absenteeism.

A great supporter and one of the driving forces behind girl-child education in Jibi community has been Malam Haruna Jibrin. He said the return of many of the girls to school has brought a lot of improvement saying only few people are yet to register.

Malam Haruna, whose wife is a beneficiary, said, “I supported my wife because being home bound, taking care of the children and doing other household chores for any woman is not advisable. I had intentions of sending her back to school before the programme started and when it came I told her to key into it if she is interested.”

He said he has seen a lot of progress in her, which has reflected in their children as she now helps the children with their home works, adding that his wife is someone who has passion for education even before now.

“She has been passionate in her business and from the learning Centre, she has learnt more,” he said.

“I can see some women in the community that are older than my wife but they are now getting closer to her and she encourages them. Many of them are now learning how to speak English even though they are not fluent but they are picking it little by little,” he said.

According to him, the challenge is that some of the women who are absent whenever they have programme give excuses that they did not inform their husband, or they have somewhere to go.

“To me, it is because they don’t know the advantage; that is why the excuses. With counselling and proper guidance, they will pick up. The issue is, we have seen many families that are lifted by educated women and it happened because such families understood the importance of education,” he said.

One of the Learning Centre Facilitators for ENGINE II work at Jibi Deidei Community, Miss Zara Jibrin, said they go from house to house and talk to parents to release their girls to enroll in schools after securing the support of the community head.

“With these efforts, most of them are now back to school and those that are not in school are in business and planning to be registered. The issue of hawking has reduced seriously because the girls now realise the importance of education as against hawking,” she said.

She said the interest in hawking originated from the girls’parents, especially the women, who want them to make money so that they could be saving for marriage.

Miss Jibrin further added that some mothers still make their girls stay at home on some lecture days.

“Whenever we have classes and we wait and didn’t see them, we go to their houses to start calling them out because their mothers would have given them items to go and sell,” she said.

A traditional leader in the community, Ibrahim Galadima, acknowledges the changes the programme has introduced to the community.

“In the past, if you tell them to go to school they will decline saying they want to marry but with the help of this programme, some of them are in school, secondary and some already in College of Education,” Galadima said.

Galadima who said many of them now prefer completing their education first before marriage, added that “no matter which venture you want to enter into, you must have little education.”

The District head, Jibi Deidei community, Mallam Abdullahi Madaki mobilized his officials after the organisation visited the community last month to call on all the hamlets head, cabinet members and the seven zone leaders to appeal to every parent to allow their children, especially the girl-child, to register in the school and learning Centre.

ENGINE I commenced intervention in the year 2014 to 2016 for the first phase of the project in Jibi community and about 60 out-of-school girls aged 16 to 19 were enrolled in the community using the programme’s marginalisation criteria.

All the 60 girls accessed the life skills, financial inclusion and livelihood interventions of the programme and have now moved into the second phase (ENGINE II from 2017 to 2020) which is in line with Girls Education Challenge (GEC) goal of transforming the lives of marginalised Nigerian girls.