Kaduna governor boosts education for out-of-school children
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In Kaduna State, Nigeria, Governor Uba Sani has prioritised education, allocating the largest share of the state’s budget to the sector for three years running. This commitment addresses the challenge of children excluded from school, treating it as an emergency requiring funding and strong leadership.
The governor’s administration increased funding to 25% to 26.14% of the N985.9 billion 2026 budget, halving tuition fees in state-owned universities and committing to recruit 2,000 primary school teachers each year.
These investments support renovations of classrooms and provision of learning materials across 23 local government areas. However, the administration recognised that simply improving schools isn’t enough to reach the most vulnerable children. Economic constraints are the primary reason children are not in school, accounting for 58.5% of cases. To address this, Governor Sani launched the Reaching Out-of-School Children Project (ROOSC), a $62.8 million, four-year intervention operating across all local government areas.
ROOSC aims to enroll 100,000 out-of-school children and benefit 1.2 million learners by building new schools, renovating existing ones, and offering flexible learning options like accelerated education and integrated Qur’anic schools. The project also provides support like menstrual health products for girls and assistive devices for children with disabilities. Early results show over 26,000 out-of-school children have been enrolled, and over 1,600 have transitioned from catch-up programmes into formal schools.
Importantly, the project conducted a detailed household survey identifying 187,719 out-of-school children, allowing for targeted interventions based on specific community needs.
