School Drop-outs: Lagos, Stakeholders Deliberate on Action Strategy

In an effort to tackle the challenge of school drop-outs in Lagos State, the state government recently gathered stakeholders across the education sector to review its action steps.

One of the actions being reviewed was the state Comprehensive Schools Programme that was launched in February to inculcate skill acquisition in learning and empowerment of students with various entrepreneurial courses.

According to the state Commissioner for Education, Mrs. Folasade Adefisayo, the programme, which birthed from Lagos State collaboration with organised private sector and non-governmental agencies, aimed to keep prospective dropouts in and improve  their future  prospects by marrying top quality vocational training to regular academics curricular.

While having a tete-a-tete with stakeholders, including administrators, principals and teachers of public secondary schools on how the programme has fared so far, Adefisayo lamented the alarming figure of out-of-school children in the state.

She acknowledged stakeholders’ inputs, however, maintained that much is still to be done to achieve the overall aim of the programme.

In enhancing the programme too, the commissioner announced the involvement of the Office of Education Quality Assurance (OEQA) to help in the maintenance and improvement of programme standards.

Justifying the programme, Adefisayo recalled her encounter with a yam seller who was one of her best Chemistry students many years ago when she was a school administrator in Osun State.

She posited that such programme would have guided the yam seller to a career path, adding that the girl’s situation was a fall out of students not being taught what they wanted to do.

“The Comprehensive Schools Programme would help them become self-reliant by teaching skills they are good at and passionate about,” she stressed.

Also, the Permanent Secretary, Lagos State Ministry of Education, Mr. Abayomi Abolaji, revealed further that plans were in top gear to expand the programme to 50 schools by September 2022, noting that selection of school was a function of available infrastructure.

Over 500 students are currently enrolled in the Lagos State Comprehensive Schools Programme, which covers categories such as agriculture; tech and digital skills; beauty and events; building and construction, as well as media and entertainment.