Kaduna stakeholders push for institutionalisation of life skills for girls

Key stakeholders in Kaduna State have renewed calls for the institutionalisation of life skills education for girls as part of broader efforts to strengthen learning outcomes, protect adolescents and prepare them for life beyond the classroom.

The call was made at a one-day follow-up of critical stakeholders’ meeting on the strategic institutionalisation of life skills under the Adolescent Girls Initiative for Learning and Empowerment (AGILE) Project held in Abuja on Thursday.

Addressing journalists at the meeting, the executive director of the Centre for Girls’ Education (CGE), Habiba Mohammed, said the engagement marked a decisive shift from pilot interventions to long-term system reform in girls’ education.

“What we have concluded today is not just another meeting, it marks a clear transition from project-based experimentation to system-level reform in how we prepare young people, especially girls, for life beyond the classroom,” she said.

She noted that for over 18 years, the CGE had worked across northern Nigeria and parts of West Africa to ensure that schooling equips girls with practical skills and confidence. She explained that the organisation’s Safe Space model, which blends life skills, literacy, numeracy, health knowledge and leadership, has delivered measurable results.

According to her, evidence from programmes such as AGILE (supported by the World Bank) and the Adolescent Girls Initiative (AGI, supported by UNFPA) shows improved school retention, delayed marriage, stronger decision-making among girls and healthier school–community relationships.

She disclosed that discussions at the meeting included updates on a draft bill seeking to institutionalise life skills as a co-curricular subject in public secondary schools across Kaduna State, describing the move as having far-reaching implications for girls’ education, protection and long-term life outcomes.

“Life skills are not ‘soft outcomes.’ They are foundational capabilities that protect learning, dignity and future opportunity,” she said.

She added that stakeholders also deliberated on a clear institutional framework for embedding life skills education, including policy and legal integration, curriculum adoption, dedicated budget lines and defined governance roles for the Ministry of Education, SUBEB, the Senior Secondary Schools Education Board and the Kaduna State School Quality Assurance Authority.

The chairman of the House Committee on Education, Kaduna State House of Assembly, Mahmud Lawal, a lawyer, assured that the legislature would work towards ensuring the bill becomes law.

“The bill is all about ensuring that our students are being protected and are given quality education in terms of life skills. That is the essence of the bill,” he said.

Lawal, who is also the Deputy Chief Whip of the Assembly, said lawmakers would ensure the bill clearly addresses its objectives, avoids duplication of existing laws and is implementable when passed.

On her part, AGILE project coordinator in Kaduna State, Maryam Sani Dangaji, said the World Bank–supported programme, which operates in 21 states, had invested heavily in life skills education for adolescent girls over the past two to three years.

She explained that AGILE’s life skills component focused on areas such as personal hygiene, health, leadership, self-agency, confidence and the value of education – skills not typically taught in conventional classrooms.

“We don’t want the efforts to be wasted as the project is about to close. That is why we want the state government to sustain this huge investment by making life skills part of the state’s curricular activities as a non-examinable subject,” she said.

She stressed that institutionalising life skills required broad stakeholder buy-in, including religious leaders, parents, community groups and relevant ministries to avoid resistance and ensure smooth implementation.

The Commissioner for Education in Kaduna State, Prof Abubakar Sani Sambo, said no fewer than 40,000 adolescent girls in the state had benefitted from a structured life skills education programme as Governor Uba Sani moves to institutionalise the initiative across public secondary schools in the state.

The state government said the programme was part of efforts to strengthen girl-child education and equip students with practical skills beyond academic learning.

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