Education

Lobby calls for govt action as number of schoolgoing Garissa girls remains low

Students are pictured at Towfiq Primary School in Garissa Township following its reopening on May 13, 2024. (Photo: Issa Hussein/EV)

By Issa Hussein | Saturday, June 22, 2024

Harrison Ochola, Garissa's FAWE coordinator, cited a survey they conducted in 2022, which he said revealed that only about 20 per cent of the girls in the county were educated.

The government and education stakeholders in Garissa County must address gender inequality, the Forum for African Women Educationalists (FAWE) has said, noting that only 11 per cent of age-appropriate girls were attending school.

Harrison Ochola, Garissa's FAWE coordinator, cited a survey they conducted in 2022, which he said revealed that only about 20 per cent of the girls in the county were educated.

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"The trend of gender disparity in the education sector is worrying. We need to synergise efforts and help girls access education," he told a review meeting by FAWE and the MasterCard Foundation, which followed a project to reduce incidences of teenage pregnancy in Kenya during the COVID-19 crisis.

At the meeting on Friday evening, Ochola blamed the findings on retrogressive cultural practices such as early marriage and female genital mutilation (FGM), which he noted caused girls to drop out of school.

Harrison Ochola, the Garissa County coordinator of the Forum for African Women Educationalists (FAWE) addresses the press during a stakeholders' meeting at a local hotel on June 21, 2024. (Photo: EV/Issa Hussein)

He highlighted solutions, including the TUSEME programme, where clubs are formed in schools to give girls a platform to talk about the challenges they face in the pursuit of education.

The initiative also advocates for the readmission of girls into school, following childbirth and other key events, to keep them from dropping out permanently.

"We are working closely with several partners, including the Ministry of Education and the Teachers Service Commission (TSC), and engaging community members to address issues of teenage pregnancy and the continuity of education."

Other interventions, he said, were the generation of credible and acceptable data on teenage pregnancy to inform the crafting and implementation of solutions, and sensitisation on sexual and reproductive health.

Ann Kamau, a school teacher and patron of the TUSEME club at Iftin Girls' High School in Garissa Township, said the clubs played an important role in helping girls overcome their challenges.

In 2023, Garissa was second to Turkana County in terms of gender disparity in education, with the Kenya National Examinations Council (KNEC) reporting that more boys than girls wrote the Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education (KCSE) exam.