A two-day media dialogue on child education
with the theme: “Leave No Child Behind” kicked off on Monday in Kano.
The dialogue, organized by the Child
Rights Information Bureau (CRIB) of the Federal Ministry of Information &
Culture in collaboration with UNICEF, is facilitated by its Communication
Specialist, Geoffrey Njoku.
It is being attended by Editors,
Columnist and Feature writers representing a diverse range of media outlets
from across Nigeria, Government officials and UNICEF specialists in
Communications and Education.
The
objective of the dialogue is to present the Nigerian Media with facts and data
in inequitable educational opportunities between able persons and persons with
disabilities, indigenous people and non-indigenes, advantaged children and
disadvantaged children and other who are at risk of exclusion from education.
The
dialogue began with introduction of media experts attending the workshop led
Geoffrey Njoku, a UNICEF Communication Specialist while the objective and
expected outcome of the dialogue was done by the Communication Officer of
UNICEF, Tosin Akingbulu,
Speaking at
the opening ceremony, the representative of the Minister of Information &
Culture said the drive for promoting equity in education for children is very
important and he tasked the Editors, Columnist and Feature writers to help the
Federal Government in tackling the low level of awareness on the need to
educate children both boys and girls. He further said that education is one of
the major key in value orientation.
The Chief
of Communication, UNICEF, Eliana Drakopoulos in her welcome remarks called on
the media to partner UNICEF and the Government at all level to promote the
Child Right Acts and its implementation.
The first
paper was presented by a Education and Development consultant, Dr Dayo Ogundimu
who spoke on the poor inequalities access to education in Nigeria and what
Nigeria can do to close the gap. He said that parents and teachers have a great
role to play in closing the gap of poor inequalities access to education.
He listed
the threat to poor inequalities access to education in Nigeria as Poverty,
Ignorance, Culture, Religious, Governance, Corruption, Politics and Political
Will.
In a
organogram, he said that Individual, Organisation, Community and Societal are
some of the ways to close the gap.
In
conclusion, he said that school feeing program, cash transfer initiative,
weekend back pack intervention, back to school programme, scholarship &
Bursaries, National undergraduate research & Innovation expos, School
Community Board Management Committee
(PTA), Community Assets Mapping – business and religious organisations, School
industry partnership including multi-national corporations (tax deductible,
donations) and government at all level
such as Local governments, State and Federal Government.
In her
paper presentation titled “The Equity Campaign and Access to Education/Playing
film spots on Access to Education” with special emphasis on “Every Child In
School” initiative, the UNICEF Communication Specialist, Eva Hinds said that
quality education is a right of all children and key to opportunities. He said
according to available statistics, over 10million children are out of school in
Nigeria.
She said
that the “Every Child In School” initiative is aimed advocating for better and
wider access to education for every children in Nigeria. She called on decision
makers to make the initiative
In his own
paper titled “Finding Space for Children in Blogsposts, Social Media and Online
Journalism”, the UNICEF Communication Specialist, Geoffrey Njoku said the first
initiative to engaged the Blogsposts, Social Media and Online Journalism began
in 2015 when UNICEF engaged them in a dialogue.
He called
on Editors, Columnist and Feature writers to dedicate more spaces for children
putting in consideration that 98million Nigerians are on internet, 16million on
mobile phones and 40% listen to radio through phones.
He cited
the example of the Child Right Bill that was abandoned by the National Assembly
but due to the power of the media, the Bill was reviewed and pass into Law to
become an Act.
He also
advised Editors, Columnist and Feature writers to serialize the Child Right
Acts on their respective platform especially as the World Children’s Day comes
up on November 20, 2018.
The final paper
for the day which include group presentation was done by the UNICEF
Communication Officer, Tosin Akingbulu. In her presentation titled “Knowing your
Objectives and Audience for your Online Campaign”, differentiate between
Communication and Behavioural Objectives by using the SMART meaning Specific,
Measurable, Achievable, Relevant and Time bound. The participants were divided
into Four group and presentation made based on chosen target audience.
The
dialogue continues on Wednesday with Field trip, Group work and other relevant
papers to be presented by Geoffrey, UNICEF Communication Specialist and Azuka
Menkiti, UNICEF Education Specialist.
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