WE WANT #NO BARRIERS TO EDUCATION – WE SAY YES TO “SAFE SCHOOL INITIATIVE”

With the lunch of the “#No Barriers” Campaign by the Global Youth Ambassadors for A World at School, I stand with my fellow Global Youth Ambassadors to strongly condemn the continuous attack on school children/girls in Nigeria. By  calling on the Government of Nigeria to take appropriate actions to make our schools a Safe Haven for learning because there can be no validation for the continuous targeting of innocent students. If the Boko Haram insurgency is not adequately dealt with, the number of children out of school in Nigeria might be on the rise. The country has 10.5 million children out-of-school, out of which 9.5 million reside in the North. North-East Nigeria where Boko Haram militants have attacked most accounts for 2.7 million out-of-school children. 

Global Youth Ambassadors (GYAs) for A World at School expressed their solidarity with the kidnapped girls of chibok by signing the #BringBackOurGirls petition that collected over 825,000 signatures globally to ensure efforts are made to make our schools safe places for learning.  They also called on public’s attention to the unpleasant existence of 10.5 million Nigerian children that have No Access to Quality Education, are not schooling, or are experiencing one barrier or the other in receiving a quality education. We are delighted that President Goodluck Jonathan in support of our plea has joined in the “Safe School Initiative” which was launched on the 7^th of May 2014 to help protect hundreds of schools in Nigeria in response to the growing number of attacks on the right to education in the country. GYAs are pleading for the Safe School Initiative to be an initiative of action with excellent management and not just mere words for it to be effective and efficient.

The global reality of having millions of children and future leaders unschooled or poorly educated is a crisis that requires immediate attention and urgent reaction. Therefore, we are demanding for the proper education of the 10.5 million Nigerian kids that make up 18.4% of the entire out-of-school children globally.

 

Some of Our Sources Inspiration:

The Abducted Girls of Chibok in Nigeria are some of our sources of inspiration, Girls whom despite the insecurity situation in their region, insisted on writing their exams and not allowing anything to deter them from having an education. Shazia and Kainat are also two of our fellow Ambassadors in Pakistan. Along with Malala Yousafzai, they were shot by the Taliban for going to school in their country just over a year ago. Their stories, and that of so many other of the youth advocates we have joined forces with, inspire us to stand up for the millions of children that are kept out of school because of poverty, early marriage, terrorism, child labour, extreme religious bias and different forms of discrimination.

We share late Nelson Mandela’s belief that, “Education is the most powerful tool which you can use to change the world.” As firm believers that quality education is the answer to the greatest challenges we face in Nigeria, we ask for the help of all business, community, religious and government leaders to fight terrorism, influence parents and guardians, raise budgets, build schools, train teachers and improve learning for all children. With your help, we can still achieve the goal of zero exclusion of children from education next year.

It has been shown that we could lift over 170 million people out of poverty simply by teaching every child in low-income countries basic reading skills. So why are we not making this a reality?

Unless we reverse current trends and accelerate our efforts, we will not even achieve universal primary education before 2086. 

So, join A World at School in our campaign to get every child into school and learning. Support our calls to action and get all the latest news on global education online (www.aworldatschool.org) on twitter (@aworldatschool) and on Facebook (www.facebook.com/AWorldAtSchool).

We thank you in anticipation of your support to save the future of all children.

Sincerely,

Nina Mbah, for Global Youth Ambassadors – A World at School.