Gender responsive education plan and need for reproductive health in Bauchi school curriculum

BY RAUF OYEWOLE

The failure of the Bauchi state to formulate an education sector plan (ESP) is forcing adolescent girls into early uptake of contraception to avoid early pregnancy that may truncate their education. A look at the National Demographic Health Survey (NDHS) report of 2023/2024 says that 15 percent of Nigerian girls are involved in teenage pregnancy while Bauchi records 17 percent.

This trend poses a danger to the aspirations of the girlchild in Bauchi. When girls are being impregnated indiscriminately with many others experiencing rape and being forced into marriage, this will worsen the number of out-of-school girls.

Why does the gender-responsive education sector plan (GRESP) matter? It addresses gender disparities in education. It breaks the barriers between individuals and society in terms of economic development and social equality.

GRESP addresses and adapts to the different needs, perspectives, and experiences of both genders. It creates equitable learning environments and outcomes for all students. It is integral to achieving broader social and economic goals and unlocks the full potential of all individuals in more equitable communities.

Failure to develop a gender-responsive ESP, its effective implementation and funding has been attributed to a contributing factor leading to high dropout rates of school while the Nation accounts for the largest number of out-of-school children amounting to about 18 million according to UNICEF. One of the disturbing consequences of dropout is teenage pregnancy, which is one of the cogs in the development –particularly among school-age girls in rural communities where efforts are being made to coerce families to release their wards for enrollment.

In states where the education sector plan caters for both genders to actualise their full potential, safe space is created for all categories of learners –including people with special needs.

Most states have adopted the ESP, which gives directions to achieve good enrollment, retention, transition and completion in school. Although findings showed that Bauchi State is yet to produce one, this has negatively affected the sector as little or no attention is being paid to gender issues in the school –including sexual and reproductive health.

Aspects of GRESP –sexual and reproductive health education, water, sanitation and hygiene have gotten poor attention over the years, discouraging thousands of girls from going to school. This has adversely affected completion in school. The lack of safe space for girls in schools has made them an endangered species. Many of them have to resort to the bush where their security threats are heightened. Hundreds of girls and women have been raped and others have been molested. Every year, the world intensifies advocacy to end violence against girls and women starting November 25th to December 10th. Bauchi recently announced that 80 people were convicted of sexual and gender-based violence.

For instance, in the 2023 report of UNICEF on Nigeria Education Fact Sheet citing data from the Multiple Indicators Cluster Survey (MICS), the primary completion rate in Bauchi was put at 30 percent being the bottom while Anambra recorded 99 percent. The differences are notable by various background characteristics.

In Bauchi, this completion rate further declined in junior secondary school to 25 percent and Anambra nosedived to 94 percent. Also in the senior secondary level, Bauchi recorded 17 percent while Anambra got the highest completion rate of 90 percent.

Findings showed that thousands of girls in different parts of Bauchi State schools could not afford to buy menstrual hygiene pads, worsened by lack of access to clean and safe space for the monthly period. The worst is stereotypes against menstruating girls. However, the state provides few sanitary pads to schools as part of first aid items.

Development partners and community development workers have been advocating for a more gender-sensitive education sector plan where adolescents would have their own ways of expressing their sexual health issues in schools. Sexual and reproductive conversation has always hit the brick wall among the community leaders with many non-governmental organisations observing that there was no commensurate acceptability to incorporate the teaching in schools over the fear of obscenity.

However, stakeholders believed that keeping the reality from the already exposed students from knowing about sexual and reproductive health is akin to depriving them of their rights to know.

Investigation showed that adolescent girls have been exposed to contraception while others had preventable reasons to leave school or abandon education due to teenage pregnancy with no proper sexual reproductive health education. Experts said that many traditional parents deliberately keep sexual reproductive health education from their children while others do not have the time to.

Speaking during a training for health workers in Azare, Nkem Ogbonna, the executive director of Better Life Restoration Initiative (BERI), explained that girls in rural communities now seek self-help by inserting different types of contraceptive methods to prevent unwanted pregnancies. According to him, the girls do not have access to adequate information on sexual and reproductive health. “Some of these practices pose serious health conditions to them particularly when they are ready to marry and produce children. I have seen some girls in communities with family planning in-plant. If this is happening at the community level, talk more about the girls in the urban centres.”

Teaching sexual and reproductive health goes beyond biology as a subject. Its incorporation into the school curriculum should be considered urgently so that there will be a dedicated person among the school administrators who could train, receive and address issues around sexual and reproductive health.

Many of the parents do not have time or even lack space to talk to their wards at home, hence the need for the government to come up with a policy where this could be taught in schools. It is different from biology. In sexual and reproductive health education, you will be taught about your body anatomy, and personal and menstrual hygiene.

There are hormonal changes during the menstrual period, the girls need support and understanding from the men. We need to understand that there should be someone these girls can walk up to for consultation and experience sharing. If the school environment does not support this or the person was not also privileged to learn about sexual and reproductive health as an adolescent, there is no way he or she could be of help.

We have seen that many people have different behaviours during their menstrual periods; some are moody, while others may be going through severe pains, when they are being taught in school, they will understand how to relate with each other. There should be a rejigged education curriculum, we need to review this because it is not giving us what we need. Let’s see if we can remove something and another be added. Sexual and reproductive health education goes beyond just what we can leave outside our school.

There is a need to have a safe corner in school where adolescent girls can talk to experienced people about their menstrual health. We have seen where some girls came down with urinary tract infections as a result of inadequate knowledge to handle their menstrual periods.

Education administrators and the government in partnership with non-governmental organisations could train a teacher per school who will be a focal person on her reproductive health education and menstrual hygiene.

The government should train girls on how to produce cost-efficient reusable menstrual pads by making raw materials available in the state, as it is unsustainable to keep providing pads in all the schools for all the girls.

Pads should be part of the entrepreneur skills acquisition or home economics the pupils should be taught in school. We cannot wait for the government to provide this in schools.

Rauf Oyewole, a journalist, wrote from Bauchi via [email protected]