The Minister of Education, Dr Tunji Alausa, has disclosed that the Federal Government has successfully returned at least one million out-of-school children to classrooms across Nigeria in the last year.

Alausa disclosed this while speaking on Channels Television. He said the milestone was achieved through a targeted nationwide intervention driven by technology and accurate data collection. He noted that the government was moving away from relying solely on foreign estimates, such as the UNESCO report which pegged Nigeria’s out-of-school children at 15 million, and was now generating its own evidence-based data.

“We have taken charge of our data. We’ve done mapping of out-of-school children in seven states, and from that exercise, only about 700,000 children were identified so far,” Alausa explained. “This burden of 18 million or 15 million out-of-school children  that is what UNESCO said.

But as I sit here today, we’ve used technology and evidence-based mapping to track, enroll, and monitor students. And I can confidently tell you, we have returned one million children back to school.”

The minister added that the education ministry, in partnership with the National Commission for Almajiri and Out-of-School Children, had also expanded tracking in the northern region, including areas with traditional almajiri schooling systems. Some states, such as Abia, reportedly had little to no visible out-of-school population based on recent field assessments, he said.

Alausa attributed the success to the adoption of a nationwide digital education dashboard that captures real-time data from primary and secondary schools at all levels—federal, state, local government, and even down to individual wards.

“For the first time in our country’s history, we now have a live digital education dashboard that gives a full picture of what is happening across our schools,” he said. “We moved from the manual annual school census to digital cloud-based data collection. This includes student enrollment, school infrastructure, teacher deployment, and even classroom performance.”

The system allows education authorities, including commissioners, local government chairpersons, and school administrators, to monitor performance, intervene based on need, and assess the impact of government policies.

According to the minister, biometric data is also being used to tag each student, helping the government monitor school attendance, track dropouts, and understand household patterns contributing to school abandonment.

“We are linking these children to their households with biometric information, so we know exactly where they are, and why they may drop out, if they do,” he added. “This is how we will truly address the root causes of out-of-school issues not by throwing figures around, but by tracking real human lives with real data.”

Alausa said Nigeria’s approach was now shifting from what he described as “flying blind” to using technology for “evidence-based planning.” He noted that dashboards can now show how a school or local government is performing academically in real time, making it easier to identify and resolve gaps.

The minister also expressed optimism that with continued support, increased budgetary allocation, and further adoption of digital monitoring systems, the country will surpass the current figure of one million children returned to school in the coming months.

He described the progress as part of President Bola Tinubu’s broader strategy to improve human capital development through education, and reaffirmed that the administration remained committed to drastically reducing Nigeria’s out-of-school population.

“We are building a future based on facts, not assumptions,” Alausa said. “And with the structure we have put in place, the results are already showing.”