The United Nations Children’s Fund and the Borno State Universal Basic Education Fund have commenced school enrolment campaign across all local government areas of the state.
The campaign comprise series of school enrolment advocacy activities supported by the Norwegian Government, European Union, the United Kingdom’s Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, German Government and the Education Cannot Wait organization to enroll and retain out-of-school children in school.
Speaking at the flag-off event in Maiduguri on Tuesday, UNICEF Education Specialist, Robyn Savage called on stakeholders to work with families and communities to ensure the success of the campaign.
“We need to work with families, parents, guardians and heads of household to ensure the benefits of education are understood and promoted. Education offers protection against poverty and underdevelopment.
We must leverage on the determination of the state government to ensure that every child, irrespective of their gender, social and economic status, has a chance at life and at maximising their potential,’’ she said.
In his address, the Guest Speaker, Prof. Bulama Kagu called on the National Council on Education to make academic calendar flexible in order to accommodate children of peasant farmers who drop out of school during harvest seasons.
He said this would ensure the success of efforts to enroll conflict-affected children in school.
He said, “Post-COVID-19, we will witness significant resettlement of IDPs in their ancestral communities. Since most of these communities are agrarian in nature, many of them will go back to farming probably with their children regardless of the school session.
Therefore, the National Council on Education should conduct feasibility studies on flexible school calendar to target children of farmers, fishermen, pastoralists and other seasonal occupations.’’
The Executive Chairman of Borno State Universal Basic Education Board, Dr. Shettima Bukar Kullima, said the board would continue to support radio and television lessons for children.
He said, “This year, we started radio lessons when schools were shut due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Now the rest of the country is looking to Borno to scale up radio programming. We have moved to television scripts and this has come to stay in Borno. We will continue to improve because the impact of insurgency is great in Borno,’’ he said.
