The Executive Secretary of the Universal Basic Education Commission (UBEC), Dr. Aisha Garba, has stated that when communities take ownership of educational institutions in their localities and assume responsibility for their sustenance, challenges such as insecurity, out-of-school children, and other problems plaguing basic education will be effectively addressed.
UBEC Emphasizes Community Participation in School Governance
Speaking in Lagos at the opening ceremony of a three-day training and retraining session for state and non-state actors on the revised School-Based Management Committee (SBMC) operational documents, Garba noted that active community participation in school management will also promote basic education and improve governance at the grassroots level. The training was organized in collaboration with the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF).
Represented by the Deputy Executive Secretary (Technical), Rasaq Akinyemi, the UBEC chief explained that SBMCs were designed to serve as the vital bridge between schools and their communities. She said these committees foster accountability, transparency, and inclusivity in school governance. Garba added that the committees decentralize decision-making, giving schools the autonomy to address their unique challenges by leveraging indigenous resources and specific community strengths.
“However, to remain effective, our frameworks must evolve. Today, we are here to operationalize the next phase of this evolution. UBEC, in close collaboration with UNICEF, has recently revised three operational documents: The SBMC Operational Manual; Guidelines for Monitoring and Mentoring of SBMCs in Nigeria; and SBMC-School Improvement Plan Implementation Manual,” she said.
Garba noted that the revisions were meticulously crafted to align with emerging educational priorities, address current grassroots challenges, and reflect global best practices. She disclosed that the workshop aims to ensure that participants, as critical intermediaries between the commission and schools, have an in-depth understanding of these updated frameworks.
She described SBMCs as critical drivers tasked with mobilizing resources, building strategic partnerships, and aggressively advocating for the enrollment of out-of-school children, among other responsibilities. She hinged the future of education in Nigeria on the ability of all stakeholders to be actively involved in decision-making processes that affect schools.
“By strengthening the SBMCs, we are laying the groundwork for a more inclusive, equitable, and quality education system,” she stated.
UNICEF and SBMC Leaders Support Community Roles
In her remarks, UNICEF Education Specialist Nneka Ogbansiegbe said community participation in education is key to achieving success. She noted that apart from helping to solve some challenges in the education sector, communities also help promote basic education. She added that communities have a great role to play in ensuring that budgetary allocations to the sector are used judiciously. The training, she said, was intended to keep SBMC members and other stakeholders up to date on the roles expected of them. She expressed the agency’s readiness to continue partnering with UBEC to provide accessible and quality education for the Nigerian child.
On his part, National Chairman of SBMC, Alhaji Umar Abdullahi, assured that SBMCs would not be found wanting in the discharge of their duties. “We are also ready to take charge of our schools and see them as our own. Anyway, they are our own; our children attend those schools, and we cannot afford to treat what is ours with levity. I have gone round the country, and I can see the peculiar problems of each zone. In the North, we can mention the issue of out-of-school children, and in the Southeast, more girls go to school than boys,” he said.
One of the resource persons at the training, Dr. Hafsat Yakasai of Bayero University, Kano (BUK), emphasized the need for workers in the Social Mobilization Department of UBEC to work together with the SBMCs to ensure effective implementation of basic education policies at the community level.
The Lagos training follows a similar one held in Kano, which had participants from the 19 northern states. The three-day session in Lagos is expected to equip state and non-state actors with updated knowledge on how to monitor, mentor, and support SBMCs to drive school improvement and community ownership.
