The Adolescent Girls Initiative for Learning and Empowerment (AGILE) Project aims to lay the foundation for long-term engagement in adolescent girls’ education and empowerment. The project is a credit from the World Bank’s International Development Association (IDA) to the Federal Government of Nigeria, for the implementation of the AGILE Project, in selected seven (7) states of the Federation viz; Borno, Ekiti, Kaduna, Kano, Katsina, Kebbi and Plateau.
The project uses secondary schools as platforms to empower girls through education, life skills, health education, GBV awareness and prevention, negotiation skills, self-agency, and digital literacy skills. The AGILE interventions in Kaduna State will reach 550 Junior and Senior Public Secondary Schools across the 23 Local Governments of the State. The project will benefit all adolescents (boys and girls) in these secondary schools.
A poor girl born in northern Nigeria faces daunting challenges throughout her life. She has a 55 percent chance of being stunted in early childhood and more than a 10 percent chance of dying, mainly from preventable diseases before she reaches the age of five (Demographic Health Survey [DHS], 2018). If she survives to her school-age years, she will have, on average, less than a 50 percent chance of enrolling in primary school and less than a 30 percent chance of transitioning to secondary school. If the girl comes from a rural community or a poor household, she is doubly disadvantaged. A girl from the poorest wealth quintile, for example, has a 24 percent chance of enrolling in primary school and only a 9 percent chance of enrolling in secondary compared to an 87 percent chance and 79 percent chance, respectively, for girls in the South-South region (Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey [MICS] 2017).
Access to junior and senior secondary education is limited and inequitable between regions and gender in Nigeria. Nationally, an estimated 10.5 million children (ages 5 to 16) are out of school, 90 percent of whom are in northern Nigeria and 7.4 million of whom are girls. School enrollment declines significantly as one progresses through the education system, particularly in northern Nigeria. For example, in the North West, only 32.1 percent of boys and girls who begin primary school complete SSS, compared to 82 percent of children in the South East and South West of Nigeria (MICS, 2017). A comparison of educational outcomes between boys and girls shows that while outcomes for boys are marginally better than for girls in the north, both boys and girls in northern Nigeria have low levels of schooling compared to children in southern parts of the country. At the primary level, for example, the school attendance rate for boys and girls in northern Nigeria was 49 percent and 44 percent, respectively, compared to an overall rate of 88 percent in the South East.
Adolescence is a critical time when physical, mental, and psychological development takes place, needs to be provided with the right information at the time. When it goes wrong or is lost, their future is lost and can affect their whole life.
The period of adolescence is considered from age 10-19. Adolescence is a period of life with specific health and developmental needs and rights. It is also a time to develop knowledge and skills, learn to manage emotions and relationships and acquire attributes and abilities that will be important for enjoying the adolescent years and assuming adult roles.
Yes, the AGILE Project recently introduced a new subcomponent called second chance education. The objective of the subcomponent is to provide out-of-school adolescent girls who may be married/pregnant/young mothers to be part of a safe space-based life skills training covering nutrition/reproductive health. hygiene etc. The girls will also be provided with livelihood skills and reproductive health training using the existing national curriculum for second chance education and the manual developed for life skills training. The training will be provided by facilitators in mass literacy centers to train the girls on these skills and provide relevant resources, tools, and equipment as necessary.
The Kaduna AGILE Project is intervening across all 23 Local Government Areas of Kaduna State.
The objective of subcomponent 2.1 of the AGILE Project is to promote social and behavioral change through communications campaigns, engagement with traditional rulers, and advocacy. This includes engagement with community leaders, parents, and religious leaders to garner support for girls’ education. The AGILE only advocates for girls’ enrolment, retention, and transition.
The financial incentive is paid to parents or caregivers mostly mothers on behalf of the beneficiary.
AGILE is a credit facility from the International Development Association (IDA), the World Bank which will be implemented from 2021 to 2025.
E & S is an acronym for Environmental and Social Safeguards. It is a spectrum of Environment, Social, Grievance Redress Mechanism (GRM), and Gender Based Violence. For the environment, attention is geared towards preventing risks and hazards both to the proponent and workers. Social is largely geared towards how the project affects the livelihood of the people negatively or positively.
For GRM, any grievance towards the project is addressed quickly to prevent disastrous rebellion from the host community as well as workers on site.
For GBV, attention is drawn towards negative relationships between contract workers and the host community, teacher and student, student to student, etc.
Violations of the rules and regulations guiding these aspects can easily stop the project.
The LGAs with the highest poverty ranking and low transition are first selected and subsequently, the program will be scaled up to all 23 Local Governments of Kaduna State.