Parliamentary Delegation to Nigeria 2012]

[2012]

[PARLIAMENTARY DELEGATION TO NIGERIA 2012]

From 11 – 18 February 2012, UK Parliamentarians visited Nigeria to gain insight into Nigeria’s education system and the impact it has on the country’s development. This delegation looked at the achievement so far and further challenges Nigeria faces to improve its basic education provision and place into education institutions 8.6 million out of school children.

APPG on Global Education for All

Contents

Contents ...... 2 Overview and recommendations ...... 3 Main issues addressed during delegation ...... 4 Recommendations emerging from the delegation ...... 6 Highlights from our visits to schools ...... 7 Ido Sarki Junior Secondary School, Federal Capital Territory, 13/2/12 ...... 7 Yangoji Junior Secondary School, Federal Capital Territory, 14/2/12 ...... 7 Ikeja Central Primary School, Lagos, 15/2/12 ...... 8 Egbe-Idimu School, Lagos, 15/2/12 ...... 9 Highlights from our meetings ...... 11 Meetings with Members of the House of Representatives ...... 11 Meetings with members of the Government ...... 12 Meetings with UK Representatives in Nigeria...... 13 Follow-up ...... 14 Appendix 1 ...... 15 Appendix 2 ...... 16 Appendix 3 ...... 19 Appendix 4 ...... 25

Overview and recommendations

In February 2012 three members of the APPG on Global Education for All undertook a delegation to Nigeria to look at the state of education in the country and what the UK Government is doing to support the effort to achieve education for all, in line with Millennium Development Goal 2, by 2015.

The participating MPs were:

 Mark Williams MP, Vice-Chair of the APPG on Global Education for All,  Helen Grant MP, Member of the APPG  Bob Blackman MP, Member of the APPG.

They were accompanied by Julia Modern, Coordinator of the APPG, and Louise Wetheridge of ActionAid International UK, on behalf of the Global Campaign for Education UK. The Commonwealth Parliamentary Association supported the MPs’ participation in the delegation through the Fellowship Scheme.

Bob Blackman MP, Helen Grant MP and other members of the delegation with participants at the ‘Every Nigerian Child’ conference, organised by a group of young UK-based Nigerians

The MPs spent a week in Nigeria, during which time they visited four schools, two of which were supported by local civil society organisations and two by UK Department for International Development projects. They also met with a wide range of education system stakeholders including schoolchildren, headteachers, civil society organisations, politicians, civil servants and members of local School-Based Management Committees. In addition, the delegation met with the UK representation to Nigeria including High Commissioner Andrew Lloyd and the DFID office in Nigeria, participated in a conference on the education sector organised by a group of young Nigerians based in the UK, and held a press conference which resulted in significant coverage in the Nigerian press. A full schedule of the delegation is included in Appendix 1.

Main issues addressed during delegation

Despite being a middle- income country Nigeria has the largest number of out of school children of any country in the world, at 8.6 million – this is 10% of all out of school primary-age children in the world. The number of out of school children in Nigeria has actually been rising, and in 2007 was 1 million higher than in 1999. Projections show that at current rates Bob Blackman MP, Helen Grant MP, and Mark Williams MP at Yangoji Junior Secondary School, Federal Capital Territory, photograph by Tom Saater for Nigeria is expected to be ActionAid home to over 12 million out of school children in 2015. The international community cannot reach Millennium Development Goal 2 on Universal Primary Education if this situation is not effectively tackled.

Four main issues stood out during the delegation in terms of core reasons why so many children are out of school in Nigeria:

1. Fees - we heard from lots of children that the informal fees that are charged despite basic education being free under Nigerian government policy caused them to struggle to attend school; 2. Early and forced marriage for girls, which we heard about directly from the girls' club at Yangoji Junior Secondary School (supported by ActionAid's Transforming Education for Girls in Nigeria and Tanzania (TEGINT) project); 3. Inadequate teacher training and large class sizes, meaning that the quality of education is very low - a particular example that stood out was DFID's research through the ESSPIN project in Kwara State which saw only 19 of 42,000 grade 3 teachers pass a test that their students should have been able to complete; 4. Money not getting through to schools - although Nigeria is a middle-income country and has large oil wealth, schools are generally extremely under-resourced because funds from Federal, State and Local level are not delivered to them. The schools we visited often did not have functioning water points, for example.

We saw three main interventions to tackle these issues:

1. Support for School-Based Management Committees (SBMC), which are groups drawn from the school and local community whose role is to support the governance of the school and also advocate for additional resources to be committed. At the DFID project in Egbe-Idimu we saw the results of a very effective SBMC, which had enabled the school to secure funding to replace the roof on a classroom block, construct a whole additional classroom block, and put in a new water source. The advantage of this approach is that it is sustainable: once the SBMCs are established and trained they can be passed over to local civil society organisations to provide limited support, as had happened at Egbe-Idimu. The SBMC intervention can help in particular to tackle issue 4 above - the problem of resources not getting through to schools. 2. Girls' clubs, which we saw at Yangoji Junior Secondary School - these provide safe spaces for mutual support, encouragement and empowerment to girls, who are often faced with a very hard struggle to stay in school. 3. Water and sanitation interventions, which are crucial for children staying in school, particularly girls.

Helen Grant MP speaks to members of the girls club at Yangoji Junior Secondary School, photograph by Tom Saater for ActionAid

Recommendations emerging from the delegation

1. The Chairs of the Senate Committee on Education and the House of Representatives Committee on Education should lead a review of the coherence between the 2004 Universal Basic Education Act, which obligates State and Local authorities to provide access to free universal basic education, and the common practice of charging unofficial fees and levies. 2. DFID Nigeria should carry out an assessment of the impact of unofficial school fees and levies on children’s enrolment, attendance and completion, with a focus on girls, and support Nigerian authorities to take their full role in ensuring reliable and transparent financing for free basic education. 3. DFID Nigeria should work with the Federal Government’s Universal Basic Education Commission and State and Local-level authorities to ensure that School-Based Management Committees receive appropriate capacity-building and resource support to be able to effectively function and advocate on behalf of their communities and students. 4. DFID should consider funding civil society organisations to disseminate information published through UBEC’s Community Accountability and Transparency Initiative (CATI) and to build the capacity of SBMCs to carry out advocacy and budget tracking to ensure that funding is delivered to schools. 5. DFID should support girls’ clubs in schools such as those run by ActionAid’s TEGINT project, and other safe spaces for girls in and out of school, through the new Girls’ Education Challenge Fund. DFID support should also seek to tackle major challenges facing girls including early marriage and violence. 6. DFID should continue its support for water and sanitation improvement initiatives. We recognise DFID’s increasing attention to value for money and recommend that a strong focus on driving down unit costs should be central to procurement decisions, alongside quality. 7. DFID Nigeria should continue to work with State Governments to raise standards in pre- and in-service teacher training, including through ESSPIN. DFID Nigeria’s new teacher training initiative should include a focus on enabling teachers to use child-centred methodologies and inclusive practices to ensure that marginalised groups such as girls and children with disabilities can fully participate in the classroom.

The delegation with Hon Farouk Lawan, Chair of the Education Committee in the Nigerian House of Representatives, and staff from ActionAid Nigeria 6

Highlights from our visits to schools

Ido Sarki Junior Secondary School, Federal Capital Territory, 13/2/12

This school is located in a poor community just outside Abuja, in the Federal Capital Territory. During the visit Mark Williams MP and Helen Grant MP asked the students what they would like to be when they grow up, and received responses including: a millionaire, a lawyer and a pilot. Some classes at the school were very overcrowded, with around 70 children.

They also visited the school ‘library’ which consisted of two bookcases of books, many of which were manuals referring to the four computers in the corner of the room. None of the computers functioned Mark Williams and Helen Grant speak to students at Ido because the school does not have a Sarki Junior Secondary School regular electricity supply. The school authorities and community told us that the biggest problems at the school were: early marriage for girls, the lack of sporting facilities, and the lack of electricity.

However, despite the evident challenges this is a very good public school. The atmosphere was positive, the students were enthusiastic and happy, and the headteacher was very dynamic. The MPs were impressed with the potential that was shown – which could be maximised with more resources.

Yangoji Junior Secondary School, Federal Capital Territory, 14/2/12

Yangoji is a more remote rural community, around 2 hour’s drive from Abuja. The challenges at this school are correspondingly greater, and here most classes have around 70 students (with the exception of the first grade, Junior Secondary 1, which has 50 students to a class). The school has no water access at all because thieves stole the water pump and the school had not been able to get it repaired.

The school is supported by ActionAid’s The delegation speak to a class at Yangoji Junior Secondary School, TEGINT project. The delegation visited in photograph by Tom Saater for ActionAid order to see the impact of an NGO’s

intervention to improve girls’ education. During the visit the MPs met with members of the SBMC, the headteacher, and the girls’ club. We also met with Danlami Kakatu Kwali, Executive Secretary for Local Education Authority, Kwali district, who has responsibility for the entire area, including Yangoji. We recently learned that following our visit the Local Education Authority has allocated funds to repair the water pump.

The school is very well integrated with the community, with the local traditional ruler playing an important role on the SBMC. The traditional ruler, who was at the meeting, is a strong supporter of girls’ education and encourages parents to send their girls to school. In an area in which early and forced marriage is very common this is important. However, the girls in the girls club do not feel that their issues are being addressed thoroughly: we heard from two girls who had dropped out of school. One came from a family of 9 children, 8 of whom were girls, of which she was the only girl still in school. She was in Junior Secondary 3, the final junior secondary class, but despite wishing to continue to Senior Secondary School and become a lawyer, knew that her parents were planning to force her to marry and end her education.

One of the most striking messages from this visit was the impact of informal fees on girls’ ability to enrol in and attend school. While primary and junior secondary school is free by Nigerian law (under the 2004 UBE act), schools can still charge ‘informal’ fees such as PTA levies. In Yangoji, we were told by the headteacher that the fees were 500 Naira per child per term (around £2). However, the girls club told us that the regular fees were 1050 per term (£4), as well as 6000 (around £25) for initial registration and 4000 (around £15) for exam fees at the end of Junior Secondary 3. A large number of the girls present reported that their families had trouble paying the fees. While the headteacher assured us that children who could not pay were still permitted to attend because of the UBE legislation, several of the girls at the girls club reported that they had had to drop out of school for years at a time because they could not pay the fees.

Ikeja Central Primary School, Lagos, 15/2/12

Ikeja Central Primary School is an urban school which caters largely to children of soldiers and policemen in the nearby barracks. The delegation visited the school to see a water and sanitation intervention funded by the UK Department for International Development’s ESSPIN project.

ESSPIN have installed a water source and built three new toilet blocks: one for girls, one for boys and one for teachers. Each toilet block consisted of four cubicles with additional urinals and basins. The work was clearly completed to a very high standard with porcelain flushing toilets and a serious attempt to ensure that they are accessible for physically disabled children (although it is not entirely clear that all issues preventing disabled children accessing the toilets had been addressed). However, the cost that was communicated to us (around £37,000) seemed excessively high. We are therefore currently carrying out follow-up with DFID staff Cubicle in the toilet block built by and Ministers on this issue. DFID’s ESSPIN project at Ikeja Central Primary School 8

Egbe-Idimu School, Lagos, 15/2/12

This school is located in a very poor neighbourhood of Lagos (described to us as ‘just above a slum’). It is in a very run-down state with extreme overcrowding in the classrooms and a very difficult learning environment for the students. The delegation visited in order to see the impact of DFID’s ESSPIN project, which had provided training and support to the school’s SBMC.

It is clear that significant improvements have been Members of the delegation with the SBMC and school community at Egbe- made at this school recently. Idimu. In the background can be seen the new classroom roof. The SBMC was able to show us photographs of the classroom block taken a year previously, which showed that one of the classrooms had no roof because it had blown off during a storm. The students were therefore unable to continue learning when it rained, a serious problem because Lagos has a severe rainy season. In addition, a year ago the school had no water source at all.

Due to the training delivered through ESSPIN, the SBMC gained the courage to approach government authorities to ask for additional resources to solve their problems. Although this process was not easy, they persevered and were eventually successful in securing:

Bob Blackman MP with the water source installed at Egbe-Idimu School by the Rotary Club of Egbe 9

 Funding from the Local Government Education Authority to replace the broken roof and refurbish the classroom block;  Funding from the State Governor to build an additional classroom block, which is currently under construction and will help to ease the congestion in the other classrooms; and  Funding from the local Rotary Club to put in a water source.

The SBMC was truly dynamic, and well-integrated with the local community. We spoke particularly with a very impressive and articulate mother of one of the students who is a local market trader, who confirmed that she found it easy to make her voice heard on the SBMC. The SBMC were clear that it was the training delivered through DFID’s ESSPIN project that had enabled them to achieve such remarkable results.

Highlights from our meetings

Meetings with Members of the House of Representatives

The delegation met with three members of the Nigerian House of Representatives: Hon. Farouk Lawan, Chair of the Education Committee; Hon. Alhasan Ado Garba, Chair of the Millennium Development Goals Committee; and Hon. Jerry Alagbaso, a member of the Education Committee who accompanied the delegation on our visit to Ido Sarki School.

Farouk Lawan is a prominent politician in Nigeria. He told us that he has a passion for education, particularly for ensuring that girls have equal access. He emphasised the importance of transparency and accountability, and of building a partnership between civil society and government so that civil society are not just seen as troublemakers. When asked what is the most important thing that needs to happen in order to ensure all children can go to school, Mr Lawan said that the link between school and employment needs to be strengthened, because when parents see that school has not helped a child to get a job it is a very big disincentive to continuing to educate their other children.

Mr Lawan was very positive about the UK’s role in supporting the Nigerian education system. He also seemed very open to contact with UK politicians and we hope to build on this important relationship in the future.

Alhasan Ado Garba, the Chair of the MDG Committee, is also currently chairing the Pan-African Network of Parliamentarians and will be closely involved with the running of a major conference on the MDGs in May 2012. Mr Garba told us that he is very concerned with the issue of fees preventing children from accessing school, which he said is a major barrier in his constituency in Kano. He also said that although some parents are sending their children to private school to get around the Bob Blackman and Mark Williams MPs with Hon Alhasan Ado Garba, low quality of public education in Chair of the MDGs Committee in the House of Representatives Nigeria, this is only possible for the better-off and the poorest are left out. The members of the delegation plan to follow up with Mr Garba to support him to raise these issues during the conference on the MDGs, as barriers created by fees for education are a common issue across much of Africa.

Meetings with members of the Government

The delegation had the opportunity to hold a brief meeting with Hon. Olugbenga Ashiru, Foreign Minister of Nigeria, on Monday 13th February. Both the delegation and the Minister were clear that the relationship between Nigeria and the UK is very important to both countries. They also discussed the potential of exchange programmes for teachers, which can both strengthen the links between the countries and provide vital The delegation with Hon Olugbenga Ashiru, Foreign Minister opportunities for learning for teachers from both countries.

We also met with two leading civil servants in the education sector: Mrs Mabel Ozumba, Director of Basic and Secondary Education at the Federal Ministry of Education; and Dr Ahmed Mohammed Modibbo, Executive Secretary of the Universal Basic Education Committee.

The conversation covered two main issues: community engagement to improve transparency and accountability for the use of resources; and teacher training. Dr Modibbo stated that UBEC has recognised the potential of the School-Based Management Committee (SBMC) model for accountability pioneered by DFID’s ESSPIN project, and as a result has made 4-5 billion Naira (around £20 million) available to support SBMCs in areas currently not covered by ESSPIN. They are also providing training for the SBMCs, and will have reached every local community in the country by April. Dr Modibbo and his staff recognised that SBMCs need support in order to function effectively. However, there did not seem to be a strong focus on what the concrete outcomes of this policy in terms of improvements to the education system would be, and therefore monitoring and evaluation of the system is particularly crucial.

UBEC is also concerned that Federal funding that is being made available to States for education is not being accessed (largely because States are required to make matching payments to access the funds to ensure true buy-in and prevent substitution of State resources). They are now taking on a process of naming and shaming the worst performers and they are starting to see the results of this: one State that had been one of the worst performers has really started to turn things around.

Mrs Ozumba at the Federal Ministry of Education was also clear that SBMCs are a crucial part of Federal policy. Support to ensure that SBMCs function will come from UBEC, but the Ministry is responsible for monitoring the implementation of the initiative. The delegation asked how it is ensured that information about budget allocations gets down to school level so that communities know what they should be receiving, in order to provide a solid base for their advocacy. Mrs Ozumba’s staff replied that UBEC is in charge of the Community Accountability and Transparency Initiative, which publishes budget allocations. CATI exposes fund flows in education and misuse or leakages, but there is a concern that this information gets stuck at the level of State Education Boards and does not trickle down to communities. The delegation asked Bob Blackman and Mark Williams with Mrs Ozumba, Director of Basic whether the Federal Ministry would and Secondary Education, Federal Ministry of Education put in a request to the UK Government for support to ensure that this system works better, and Mrs Ozumba pledged to investigate this option and follow up with us.

Meetings with UK Representatives in Nigeria

The delegation met with Andrew Lloyd, High Commissioner to Nigeria, at the beginning of the visit for a very useful briefing on the situation in Nigeria and the UK’s role. We hope that this will be the beginning of a further relationship between members of the delegation and the UK representation in Nigeria.

In addition, we held several meetings with staff of the Department for International Development (DFID) office in Nigeria, notably Richard Montgomery, the Head of Office. These meetings confirmed the strategic importance of the relationship between the UK and Nigeria, as well as providing a good briefing on the UK’s work with the Nigerian education sector. Topics of discussion included ensuring DFID projects have a rigorous focus on value for money, DFID support for teacher training, and possible future support from DFID for the CATI initiative to ensure that information about government budgets is effectively communicated to communities.

Follow-up

The members of the delegation are currently carrying out follow-up. So far they have:

 Held two APPG Global Education for All events. The first, on 29th February 2012, was to brief other members of the APPG on their findings. Attendees included the Shadow Minister for International Development, Tony Cunningham MP. Notes from this meeting are included in Appendix 2 to this report. The second, on 16th July 2012, involved a delegation of Nigerian Government officials and civil society representatives and provided as an opportunity for the delegation members and UK-based Nigerian diaspora to learn about recent developments and follow up on some of the issues raised during the delegation. Notes from this meeting are included in Appendix 3.  Held an adjournment debate on ‘Education Projects (Nigeria)’ on the 20th March, at which the Right Honourable Minister of State for International Development Alan Duncan MP responded on behalf of the government. A transcript can be found at http://bit.ly/IRCgUr  Written blogs and local media articles to highlight the issues that arose from the delegation. A list of current publications is in Appendix 4, and further submissions (for example to House Magazine) are currently being prepared.  Organised a follow-up meeting with the Nigerian High Commissioner to the UK Dr Dalhatu Sarki Tafida OON OFR, which will be accompanied by a press conference targeting Nigerian media. This meeting was scheduled for Wednesday 14th March but unfortunately had to be postponed due to a vote in the Commons. We are currently rescheduling the meeting.  Organised a follow-up meeting with Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for International Development Stephen O’Brien MP, which took place on Monday 19th March, shortly before the Minister visited Nigeria himself. The delegation members shared their findings with the Minister and encouraged him to investigate the issues that they found most pressing.

Appendix 1

Schedule

Monday 13th February Activity 08:00 School visit in Ido Sarki on outskirts of Abuja (accompanied by the Hon. Jerry Alagbaso, Member of the House of Representatives Committee on Education) 12:30 Lunch with British High Commissioner to Nigeria Mr Andrew Lloyd, CMG, MBE 14:00 Meeting with Richard Montgomery, Head of Office, UK Department for International Development Nigeria (DFID Nigeria) 15:00 Meeting with Nigerian Foreign Minister Olugbenga Ashiru

Tuesday 14th February Activity 08:00 Visit to Yangoji Junior Secondary School, which is supported by ActionAid’s TEGINT project 13:00 Meeting with local Education Secretary, Yangoji region 18:00 Dinner with ActionAid and Farouk Lawan, Chair of the Education Committee in the House of Representatives

Wednesday 15th February Activity 07:00 Fly to Lagos 10:00 Visit Central Primary School, Ikeja, to see water and sanitation project supported by DFID through ESSPIN 12:00 Visit Unity Primary School, Egbe-Idimu, to see SBMC intervention supported by DFID through ESSPIN 16:00 Return to Abuja

Thursday 16th February Activity 09:00 – 11:00 Meeting with DFID Human Development Staff and Richard Montgomery 11:50 – 12:50 Plenary session: the relevance of education to nation building, Every Nigerian Child Project (ENCP) conference 14:00 – 15:00 Speaking at ENCP conference on parliamentarians’ role in holding government to account 19:30 – 21:30 Dinner with ENCP team

Friday 17th February Activity 08:30 – 10:30 Press conference with ActionAid 11:00 – 13:00 Meeting with Hon Alhassan Ado Garba, Chair of the House of Representatives Committee on the Millennium Development Goals 13:00 – 14:00 Meeting with Dr Ahmed Mohammed Modibbo, Executive Secretary, UBEC 14:00 – 16:00 Meeting with Mrs Mabel Ozumba, Director of Basic and Secondary Education, Federal Ministry of Education

Appendix 2

Nigeria Delegation Debrief Event

Room O Portcullis House, Wednesday 29th February 2012

Present: Bob Blackman MP, Helen Grant MP, Mark Williams MP, Chris Evans (Mark Williams’ office), Tony Cunningham MP, Annette Brooke MP, Ali Louis (Tony Cunningham’s office), Miranda Cavanagh (Simon Hughes MP’s office), Julia Modern (RESULTS UK), Louise Wetheridge (ActionAid), Jonatane Budiaki (RESULTS UK), Clare Battle (RESULTS UK)

Opening

Julia Modern opened the meeting by giving a brief overview of the delegation. The objective of the trip was to look at the education sector in Nigeria and how UK aid was being used, with a particular focus on transparency and accountability. Although Nigeria is a middle income country there are still 8.6 million children out of school, the highest number anywhere in the world.

Over 2 days of site visits the delegation visited schools supported by ActionAid (through the TEGINT project) and DFID (through the ESSPIN project); they also held numerous meetings with politicians, DFID staff, the British High Commission, and others.

Bob Blackman MP

The delegation embarked on the trip with their eyes open as to the barriers preventing education in Nigeria. The delegates hoped to look at whether the UK was investing money in the right ways; what could be achieved if the UK spent more money; and how we can effectively exert control over the money that is spent.

Toilets and sanitation came across as a great obstacle, particularly in terms of getting girls into school, and at the DFID project in Lagos the MPs saw first-hand how UK money could support the development of toilet blocks (although they are still investigating whether this represented good value for money). Corruption is rife, so making sure money is used in the right way is key.

Embracing and working with the existing local culture is also key to encouraging children to participate in schools; the incorporation of the traditional leader into the school based management committee (SBMC) of one school we visited had clearly made a huge difference, and indicates how attitudes can be changed, as he was a real advocate for girls’ education.

It is hard to say if the delegates saw a typical picture; Nigeria is a great country, but the range of incomes is huge. Given the facilities they have, schools are achieving a remarkable amount, and it is recognised by everyone that education is the way to break down barriers.

Helen Grant MP

The trip was hugely informative, and allowed MPs to get a good feel of the situation and the pressing issues facing Nigeria. These included:

 An informal fee structure  Forced marriage and early marriage  Inadequate teacher training  Corruption and money not getting through to schools

The delegates saw a lot of positive initiatives, including the School Based Management Committees (SBMCs) and the girls clubs.

Despite humble conditions there are massive aspirations and a very high standard of work among children. One school library that the delegates visited had only around 20 books and 4 computers that didn’t work; the MPs are considering organising a campaign to get more resources through to the school, in order to ensure their trip has a tangible outcome.

Mark Williams MP

Mark Williams MP thanked Julia Modern and Louise Wetheridge for their help in organising the delegation.

In many ways the officials the delegates met ticked all the right boxes in their commitment to basic education; the Chair of the Education Committee in the House of Representatives is very switched on, and many of the relevant structures are already in place. However, concerns remain about whether the money from Federal, State and Local government is getting through to schools. This is why School Based Management Committees are so important, as they enable the community to hold officials to account and put the pressure on. The benefits could be clearly seen in Lagos, where SBMCs were promoting engagement across a wide cross-section of the community, all of whom were very aware of the value of education. The significance of the SBMCs cannot be understated, particularly in giving people the information they need to ask questions of government.

The teacher training in Nigeria appears to focus on ‘chalk and talk’, with very little differentiation or provision for special needs. The girls’ initiatives such as girls clubs ticked a number of boxes, but it was questionable how confident girls would be to actually voice their concerns. Furthermore, fees were charged even in state schools, and there was a discrepancy between what the delegates were told by the Headmaster and what they heard at the girls’ club regarding the level of school fees.

The links between education and sanitation are clear; in one school the delegation visited 700 children had had no running water for some weeks. On teacher quality, DFID research has suggested that of 42,000 grade 3 teachers in Kwara State who were given a test that their students should have been able to complete, only 19 passed. There is a clear need to tackle these basic issues.

The potential of the country is vast, but Nigeria is also fertile territory for unrest, particularly in the north where there is a clear link between illiteracy and terrorist groups. However, it is heartening to look at the newspapers; Nigeria has a vibrant and free press that is asking all the right questions.

Julia Modern

One of the schools visited by MPs in Lagos had no roof or water, and was hugely overcrowded. DFID’s ESSPIN project supported the training of a school based management committee, which then carried out advocacy with the state government and local actors. In this way they managed to get the local government to provide a new roof, the state government to provide a new classroom block, and the local rotary club to provide a water source. Previous attempts at writing to government officials had not worked; but within 5 days of setting up a Facebook page threatening to withdraw support from the State Governor’s re-election campaign, work at the school had started. The SBMC training provided by DFID was integral in providing the skills and confidence needed to get the work done.

DFID’s model of school based management committees has now been adopted across Nigeria, but it remains unclear how much the committees are being trained or supported. DFID has stated that they are looking into the possibility of helping schools and SBMCs make use of the federal budget data released through the Community Accountability and Transparency Initiative.

Many states are failing to match fund federal spending provided through the Universal Basic Education Commission – as they are supposed to do in order to release federal funds – but communities are now beginning to name and shame their authorities.

On the final day of their trip the MPs held a session on accountability and transparency at the Every Nigerian Child conference; it was the most packed session at the whole conference, and there was a clear appetite to find out more about how Parliamentarians in the UK respond to their constituents and what accountability mechanisms exist here.

Discussion

Tony Cunningham reiterated the difficulty of breaking down cultural barriers, and highlighted the importance of school materials that are both relevant and accessible. Books in pupils’ mother tongue are central to this. It is important to ensure we are talking about quality of education, not just quantity.

In the UK a huge amount of resources are invested in preschool education, but this is not something we prioritise in Africa. Teacher training is also very important to the quality of education, particularly in terms of ensuring the participation of girls and disabled children, as are the issues of water and sanitation.

Appendix 3

Education and literacy in Nigeria: a conversation with leaders

Committee Room 9, House of Commons, Monday 16th July 2012

APPG Members in attendance: Hilary Benn MP, Bob Blackman MP, Duncan Hames MP, and Mark Williams MP.

Stepping Stones Nigeria delegation:

 Alhaji Bello Kagara - Project Coordinator for international development partners at the Universal Basic Education Commission.  Professor Comfort Ekpo - Vice Chancellor at the University of Uyo and Director of the Read and Write Now Project in Akwa Ibom State.  Gary Foxcroft – Director, Stepping Stones Nigeria  Louise Gittins - Teacher Training and Research Officer, Stepping Stones Nigeria  Dr (Mrs) Anthonia Inaja - Head of Department, Department of Educational Foundations, Guidance and Counselling at the University of Calabar, Cross River State, and Jolly Phonics research team leader, University of Calabar.  Mr Emmanuel Inaja - Manager of the implementation team for the Read and Write Now project in Cross River State.  Dr (Mrs) Julia Omang – Registrar, University of Calabar.  Mrs Ninka Takon - Director of Examinations and Certifications, Cross River State Ministry of Education.  Mr Patrick Uzu - Jolly Phonics trainer and Stepping Stones Nigeria literacy representative in Nigeria  Mrs Stella Uzu - Jolly Phonics trainer  Felicia Willow – Chief Operating Officer, Stepping Stones Nigeria

Opening

Mark Williams MP opened the meeting, recounting his experiences in Nigeria during the APPG on Global Education for All delegation in February 2012. He emphasised that the visit was a learning experience, and that he wouldn’t presume to have answers to the issues of education around the world. Two things that particularly impressed Mark during the visit were the huge potential that Nigeria possesses, and the enormous enthusiasm and thirst for education among young people. As a former teacher Mark understand the difficulties that teachers face with classes of over 70 students, which make it very difficult to respond to the individual needs of students.

Mark then introduced the delegation from Stepping Stones Nigeria, a small UK-based charity working in the Niger Delta region of Nigeria.

Gary Foxcroft, Director, Stepping Stones Nigeria

Synthetic phonics is recognised as the most effective method of teaching literacy in the UK and has been adopted by the Department for Education as good practice.

In 2006 Gary and his wife initiated a pilot project to test the use of synthetic phonics to teach literacy in 6 schools in Akwa Ibom State. After one year, children taught with this method were reading 7 months above their expected reading ages, while of those who weren’t taught using this message only one was able to read one word.

Stepping Stones presented the evidence to the Akwa Ibom State Commissioner for Education, and a delegation came to the UK to learn more about the method. Following this, 2,500 teachers in Akwa Ibom were trained. Thanks to a British company called Jolly Phonics Stepping Stones are able to offer free training and materials to all primary one and two teachers.

The project is now being rolled out to Cross River State, next door to Akwa Ibom. There have now been pilot studies in 8 studies and there are plans to work outside the Niger Delta region in the future.

Stepping Stones is also working with the Universal Basic Education Commission (UBEC) and the Federal Ministry for Education (FME) to change the curriculum. Since last April the National Educational Research and Development Council has drafted a new curriculum that incorporates synthetic phonics.

Key recommendations that have emerged from this visit to London, during which the delegation attended a conference at the Department for Education, include:

 Synthetic phonics should be incorporated into the curriculum for primary 1 and 2;  All teachers, government officials and inspectors should be trained in synthetic phonics;  Counterpart funding should be provided by UBEC;  Teacher training colleges need to incorporate synthetic phonics;  At local government level there should be a dedicated synthetic phonics officer in every district.

Alhaji Bello Kagara, Project Coordinator for international development partners, UBEC

Literacy in Nigeria needs to be understood in context – there are over 10 million out of school children in the country. Over 50 million almost totally illiterate adults out of a population of 150 million people or so. Among the school population there is relatively low achievement at all levels.

The Government is taking an approach the focuses on access, equity and quality in education. UBEC was set up in 1999 to ensure provision of free compulsory education to all children (adults are the responsibility of other departments). Its function is to set standards at basic education level, and to send funding to States. It is also addressing the challenge of teacher quality, materials and curriculum development.

Between 2005 and 2010 more than 44,000 classrooms were built, and 61 renovated. 1.3 million items of furniture were provided and 18,000 toilets built. 86 million textbooks were distributed, along with 10,000 sets for special needs children.

There are two main issues: funding and low quality of teaching. Teacher attitude in particular needs a vigorous strategy to address.

Alhaji Kagara was in South Korea last month and found that pupils’ attainment was surprisingly high. Nigerian children are just as capable but the system is failing them.

Questions:

Ifeolu Omoniyi Akintunde

In Nigeria the education of visually impaired people is not often addressed. I am a visually impaired Nigerian and I was schooled in Nigeria, but I was very lucky. Most cannot get access, including access to learning materials and integration into mainstream society. There is a lot of prejudice in Nigeria. In my current life I have access to IT tools that allow me to live a life like non-disabled people – when will Nigerians get access to this?

Dr Gill Gemin

Alhaji Kagara, I am glad that you referred to funding. How do you want to engage with diasporans? The problem is not a lack of resources, but distribution.

Lara Agboola-Oyegue

The Nigerian Government needs to get its priorities right. If we want to get help from outsiders like the British Government we have to put something down ourselves first.

Responses:

Gary Foxcroft:

There is a huge gap for visually impaired people. Our programme is very small and hasn’t deal with this directly, but there is a real need for policies to recognise rights and implement them.

Alhaji Kagara

The Universal Basic Education (UBE) Act made provision for 2% of UBEC’s funds to be given for the education of ‘physically challenged’ students. Implementation is starting, and States receive money on a quarterly basis for special education. There are also resources from other areas including donor partners and individuals.

Nigeria is a vast country with many competing needs. We are partnering with international development organisations including JICA (Japan), DFID (UK), and China. The door is also open for diaspora to come and assist.

From 2008 – date the Federal Minister pursues only 4 issues as a framework. At the moment these are:

1. Teacher quality 2. Access and equity 3. Funding 4. Teacher recruitment.

Gary Foxcroft:

In Akwa Ibom State all Stepping Stones funding is matched by the State, and in Cross River the whole project is being funded by the State Government. But the States look to the Federal Government to allocate enough money to the States.

Questions

Gori Olusina Daniel:

What has been achieved? UBEC has a mandate to fund development and progress has been made, but there are issues: a lot of money has gone into UBEC but not a lot has been delivered to the States. Akwa Ibom and Cross River States both have a lot of money sitting in UBEC accounts that they have not accessed [this is matched funding, and the States must put in funds in order to release it]. Even after this, funding needs to reach the schools. The management of schools is done too centrally. At State and local level need to be 100% clear what resources should be going to schools. What commitments can we get from UBEC and the State representatives who are here?

Jolly Phonics seems like an opportunity for UBEC, will they fund it?

Hannah Acuah

I work for the Knowledge Channel. We have many projects in Calabar. Many companies are not hiring at the moment so we need to encourage young entrepreneurs. In Western countries we have a project which supports black students to secure top employment or get into top universities. We are looking to do this in Africa, using technology to make it accessible.

Sunit Bagree

Alhaji Kagara mentioned that 2% of UBEC funds are used to support education for disabled children. Does this represent the prevalence of disability and the level of marginalisation of disabled people? The WHO World Report on Disability concluded last year that 15% of the world’s population has a disability. Also, what is being done to tackle the stigma of disability?

Responses

Alhaji Kagara:

Every Nigerian school now has a School-Based Management Committee (SBMC), which is an initiative to facilitate the grassroots management of schools. We also have the Community Accountability and Transparency Initiative (CATI), which is a tool that can be used to monitor funding. Not all funding is currently getting to schools. We are trying to ensure that every SBMC take stock of what is due to their school.

Mark Williams MP

During our visit to Nigeria in February one of the things we saw was that where SBMCs were functioning well they were achieving great things. One SBMC we saw in Lagos needed building work done, and had taken the

initiative to write to the Governor pointing out that he was up for re-election soon and that they would not support him if he was not providing the services he was supposed to. The building work was done very quickly!

Alhaji Kagara

UBE funding is distributed according to the following formula:

 50% to matching grants for the States  14% to address educational imbalances  5% as rewards for good performance  2% to UBE act implementation  2% to UBE monitoring facility  2% to special education  15% to instructional materials  10% to teacher development.

Questions

Can we focus more on technology to make skills relevant for the modern world?

Louise Wetheridge

I work on a girls’ education project called TEGINT, which works in Northern Nigeria. There are huge problems with getting girls into school and keeping them there. Accountable and transparent financing for education is vital. I would like to know firstly what your views are on the involvement of the private sector in education in Nigeria. Secondly, are new teacher initiatives working together, for example is the UBEC work on teachers connected with the UK Government Department for International Development’s new teacher training initiative?

Duncan Hames MP

I recently went to a school in my constituency to celebrate the Send My Friend to School campaign. Many local schools in the UK are involved and the Prime Minister recently spoke about the campaign and the importance of civil society being involved in improving education globally. Are there any plans to tap the engagement of schools through this campaign to help the situation in Nigeria? For example partnerships between schools and teacher exchanges can be very valuable for schools in the UK and in Nigeria.

Dr Ife Nnatuanya

Regarding the comments that have been made about the quality of teaching, teachers in Nigeria are some of the worst paid in the world. How can we expect them to be inspired? Currently UBEC makes a very large allocation of resources to books, but sometimes the children can’t read them because they can’t read – other areas need more attention.

Responses

Gary Foxcroft:

Teacher morale is one of the biggest issues we face in Stepping Stones programmes. Sometimes teachers are on strike for 6 or 7 months at a time, and often they haven’t even been paid at all. Jolly phonics gives teachers a skill, and you can see it improving morale – but clearly this is a big problem.

Alhaji Kagara

Teacher morale and teacher attitude are linked. The Government established TSS, a skills body. The Government is committed to funding it, but it has not been implemented yet. At the moment States can determine their own priorities, the Federal Government does not decide this.

On facilitating connections with other organisations including diaspora – please write to us about this. The door is open to you all.

Girls’ education is indeed a big problem, especially in the north. Some funding is allocated for this, but not enough.

Textbooks: our challenges are numerous. To empower teachers and students classrooms and infrastructure are needed. We do interventions on this, for example the purchase of instructional materials.

School links: these do exist. Our door is open for you to liaise with UBEC or State Governments (in States it would be the Executive Chairman of the State Universal Basic Education Board).

Mark Williams MP

Mark closed the meeting, ending on a note of optimism and hope. He noted the huge potential of the Nigerian economy and its importance as a partner for the UK. He also spoke of education as the key to individual advancement, as well as national advancement.

Bob Blackman MP

Speaking about the APPG’s visit to Nigeria in February, Bob said that the group had only been able to view a small number of schools in the 7 days they spent in the country. However, it was clear that there was tremendous discipline and enthusiasm from the students. Children walk incredible distances to reach school, and this enthusiasm is needed in the UK!

There is huge potential in Nigeria, and the country is the UK’s most important ally in Africa.

Appendix 4

UK media generated around the APPG delegation:

 http://www.actionaid.org.uk/101715/blog.html?article=3839  http://www.actionaid.org.uk/101715/guest_blog_the_impact_of_poverty_and_early_marriage_on_ nigerian_girls_education.html?article=3903  http://www.libdemvoice.org/a-postcard-from-abuja-27314.html  http://blog.results.org.uk/2012/02/27/uk-mps-visit-nigeria-to-learn-about-the-education-system/  http://ukinnigeria.fco.gov.uk/en/news/?view=PressR&id=731080482

Mark Williams MP has also had articles in local newspapers. Links to be supplied shortly.