Sanwo-Olu moves to reduce out-of-school children, boost academic excellence

Ahead of the new school term in January 2022, the Lagos State Universal Basic Education Board (LASUBEB) through the EKOEXCEL programme has stepped up its public awareness campaign aimed at driving enrolment, reducing the number of out-of-school children inline with the state government’s ‘Leave No Child Behind Policy’ and boost academic excellence from a foundational level in Lagos public schools.

The campaign also aimed at engaging parents and communities on the need and importance of education and connecting citizens to the government’s economic growth agenda through the transformation of the education sector. The programme and its goals are being showcased on billboards, street lamp banners, radio jingles, TV interviews, and commercials as well as social media engagements with reputable influencers.

This latest public awareness campaign follows the recent enrollment exercises across 10 local government and local council development areas that involved local community leaders and influencers, including Nollywood celebrities.

Commenting on the awareness campaign, LASUBEB’s Executive Chairman, Wahab Alawiye-King said it was in fulfillment of Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu’s promise of quality education to all Lagos pupils as spelled out in his THEMES agenda.

He said: “Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu is very passionate about basic education and his dream is to reduce the number of out-of-school children to the minimum while deploying the latest technology for instruction in schools. We cannot afford to fail in the task he has entrusted into our care, hence our effort to make Lagosians know more about EKOEXCEL and its benefits.”

Also commenting, Permanent Board Member of LASUBEB and oversight chair of the EKOEXCEL programme, Adebayo Adefuye stressed the need to convince parents and guardians that were yet to enroll their children in government schools to do so as they are assured of quality instruction.

“Our public schools in Lagos are now at par with their private counterparts, so there’s no need to keep children at home while looking for money to pay their fees in private schools. Public schools, particularly those in EKOEXCEL have e-learning devices, so parents, guardians, please enroll your children in our schools. You won’t regret it. Education is the future and the present administration recognises that hence the massive investments in it,” Adefuye said.

Sanwo-Olu launched EKOEXCEL in 2019 to provide quality education to both the rich and the poor as well as up-skill teachers leveraging technology. So far, over 12,000 headteachers and teachers have been moved from analogue to digital teaching, using tablets and updated curriculum.

Over 14,000 primary school teachers from 1,009 public primary schools have been captured under the scheme. The education reform programme has also recorded remarkable gains in enhancing the teacher-pupil interaction experience through technology (eLearning) in Lagos State primary schools.

The transformational intervention has also boosted uniformity and strict adherence to the curriculum with teachers’ tablets preloaded with lessons and content that can be effectively monitored for standardisation across all of Lagos’ 1,009 public primary schools.