Kwara State Governor, AbdulRahman AbdulRazaq, has voiced concern over the alarming rate of out-of-school children, particularly adolescent girls, across the country, describing the situation as deeply troubling.

Speaking on Thursday during a stakeholders’ meeting in Ilorin focused on implementing the NEEDS Assessment of Out-of-School Girls and Young Women in Kwara State, the governor pledged his administration’s commitment to collaborating with relevant stakeholders to tackle this issue and enhance educational quality.

This initiative is part of the Kwara State Adolescent Girls Initiative for Learning and Empowerment (AGILE) , aimed at addressing barriers to education for young women and empowering them through learning opportunities. The event was jointly organised by Kwara AGILE and the non-governmental organisation, ABYEM Helping Aid Foundation.

Represented at the meeting by the Commissioner for Education and Human Capital Development, Hon. Lawal Olohungbebe, Governor AbdulRazaq stated: “The prevalence of out-of-school children, especially among adolescent girls, is a cause for great concern nationwide.” He reiterated the need for collective action to reverse this trend and ensure equitable access to education.

“It is not doubtful that this case is more prevalent in the northern part of the country, which Kwara State is not totally exempted.

“The incident is detrimental to the society, which requires the support of all stakeholders to salvage it.”

The governor explained that AGILE Project had factored the occurrence, stressing that a sub-committee, known as Second Chance, has been designed to critically assess and amend the case of out-of-school children.

“It is designed to make children who have missed conventional educational system to learn through non-formal educational centres” he stated.

The governor said, “One of the wings of the second chance education is the vocational training. The role of the consultant is to identify the livelihood and marketable skills for the implementation of the out-of-school programme to give second chance education and empowerment to our adolescent girls and young women in the state. This will improve their economic prosperity and financial confidence for sustainability.”

He urged the consultant, ABYEM Helping Aid Foundation, “to work assiduously to give inspiring outcome that will assist the implementation process.

“As a non-governmental organization, it is not deniable that you’re conversant with the activity. I am optimistic that your engagement is as a result of your previous knowledge in the field.”

Earlier, Chief Executive Officer of ABYEM Helping Aid Foundation, Prince Abiodun Otepola, said the partnership was targeted at girls between 15 and 25 years.,street hawkers and beggars, who dropped out of school, “to make them return to classrooms or empower them as might be applicable, in order make them meaningful to the society and fulfil brighter futures”.

He said, “ABYEM Helping Aid Foundation has concluded arrangements to empower 1300 Out-of-School Girls across the 16 local governments area of the state.”

According to him,” The programme is about giving our girls that have dropped out of school a second chance.

“We are partnering the state government and the World Bank to enable our girls between the ages of 15-25 years go back to school or enrol them for skills or handwork for those that will not be able to go back to school.

“They want us to go and look for those that are affected if they will be able to go back to school and make them useful in the society.”

He added, “After this inception programme, we have a population of 1,300 across the state and we have identified 20 vocational centres across the 16 local governments in the state and in each local government we are going to be meeting with 65 as sampling for each local government.”

The governor stated, “We are going to populate the register for the state government through AGILE which will help to empower them after training and vocational studies.”

Chairman, Parents Teachers Association (PTA), Kwara State Chapter, and First Makama of Ilorin, Alhaji Ibrahim Oniye, in his remarks, urged the stakeholders, including various NGOs, human rights activists, among others, who were present to first find out the foundational cause of out-of-school children and solve the problems in order to put education in the country on strong and sound footing.

The septuagenarian also called on the consultant and the state government to focus on the boys and young men who had also dropped out of school, stressing that their cases are also critical.