An estimated figure from the National Statistics Office (NSO) and the Department of Education has revealed that there are over 500,000 school-aged children out of school.
But for the first time, a workshop is currently underway to address this issue, called the Out of School Age Children Initiative. The workshop aims to collect data and create strategies to address issues of children missing out on education.
Assistant Secretary, James Agigo, who heads the Education Department’s Research, Evaluation and Statistics, said the workshop is in its first phase where data profiling and cleansing is the main agenda of the workshop.
Mr Agigo said once all data are collected, strategies will be created to address this issue.
“We are in the first phase of this workshop. We are working with variable data and we have to get the accurate number before we roll out strategies,” Agigo said.
The final report of the workshop will be presented to the public by the Education Secretary and Minister once all data is collected and reports are finalised.
