Save Our Needy Celebrates First International Education Day.

Save Our Needy joined the rest of the world yesterday to celebrate the very first International Education Day. The theme of this day was “Education for Peace and Development”.

Education is a key driver of social change and economic growth, and its importance for achieving gender equality has been widely recognized. It has always been an important element for the development of an individual. It broadens the horizon of one’s mind. Education is one of the most powerful tools we can implement in our global efforts to promote world peace and security.

Education offers people a ladder out of poverty and a path to a promising future. Sadly, about 265 million children and adolescents around the world still do not have the opportunity to enter or complete school. More than a fifth of them are of primary school age.

Nigeria has a high rate of illiteracy. At least 40% of the population, that is about 75 million people cannot read or write a simple sentence. Of this population, the majority of them are women. Forty per cent of Nigerian children aged 6-11 do not attend any primary school with the Northern region recording the lowest school attendance rate in the country, particularly for girls. Despite a significant increase in net enrollment rates in recent years, it is estimated that about 4.7 million children of primary school age are still not in school.

Empowering girls to become self-reliant

 

The education sector in Nigeria today, particularly in Northern Nigeria, faces a lot of challenges including a lack of skilled teachers, poor infrastructure, lack of learning equipment and unconducive environment for learning.

Another challenge in Nigeria is the issue of girls’ education. Among the critical challenges that impede girls’ education are poverty, conflict and violence, early marriages, harmful traditional practices, long distances to school, religious beliefs and inadequate menstrual hygiene.

Save Our Needy works to advance equal access to quality education for all.

"Education is more than a right, education is a remedy. In a world gripped by crises, education can be a pathway to growth and a stepping stone toward peace."- Rania Al Abdullah

Happy #EducationDay

Schools In North-East Nigeria Finally Reopen Despite Fear Of Boko Haram Attacks

Hundreds of schools in northeast Nigeria have reopened for the first time in a year and a half - but many teachers and pupils are reluctant to return because of persistent violence in the region.
Almost 450 schools have reopened in Borno state since October 2015, more than 18 months after education was halted in the wake of an attack by Boko Haram militants on a boarding school in neighbouring Yobe state in which they killed 59 students.

Some schools in Adamawa and Borno states are doubling the number of classes to provide education for people uprooted by the conflict as well as for local children, according to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).
Displaced teachers across the region have volunteered to teach and many children who fled violence in remote rural areas have gone to school for the first time, the UN children's fund UNICEF said.
"Prioritising education is absolutely essential if we are to avoid losing the next generation to more poverty, hopelessness and the risk of radicalisation," said Toby Lanzer, UN humanitarian coordinator for the Sahel.

Nigerian children at UNICEF-supported learning center in Dalori camp in Maiduguri

Borno is the birthplace of the six-year insurgency waged by Islamist militant group Boko Haram, which kidnapped 276 girls from a secondary school in the village of Chibok in April 2014.
A regional offensive by Nigeria, Niger, Chad and Cameroon earlier this year drove Boko Haram from much of the territory it held in northern Nigeria. But the militants have since struck back with a renewed wave of deadly raids and suicide bombings.

More than 1200 schools have been attacked in northeast Nigeria and hundreds of teachers and pupils have been killed by bomb blasts, raising fears among communities about the safety of resuming education, according to UNICEF.
"Many parents are reluctant to send their children - especially girls - to school... even some teachers are afraid of going to work due to the targeted attacks, threats of attacks or general insecurity," said Eva Ahlen from UNICEF in Nigeria.

The United Nations is working with the Nigerian government to make schools safer, train teachers and offer basic education to those staying in camps and with host families, where nine in 10 of Nigeria's 2.2 million internally displaced people are living.
Even before the conflict in the northeast, Nigeria had the highest number of out-of-school children in the world, more than 10 million, according to OCHA.

Article by Kieran Guilbert (Thomson Reuters Foundation)

One of the main aims of Save Our Needy is to alleviate poverty through the promotion of education. We believe that through education, millions of people can be saved from poverty and despair. Help empower a girl today and contribute to bringing a whole community out of poverty. Support our girl-child initiatives. Visit our website to know more about our activities: www.saveourneedy.org
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