The Importance of Universal Basic Education ranges from improving access to high-quality basic education to promoting and improving educational service delivery.
This article gives an in-depth analysis of the importance of Universal Basic Education and its objectives.
What is the Universal Basic Education?
The Nigerian Government conceptualized the Universal Basic Education program in order to reform and improve the standard of basic education across the entire Nigerian federation.
What are the major objectives of Universal Basic Education?
According to the Universal Basic Education portfolio, the major objectives include:
- To make sure there is an unrestricted enrollment into a formal educational medium through the provision of mandatory and free education to children that are ready to go to school covering
i. Primary Education.
ii. Junior Secondary Education in a bid to revolutionize the development of early care of children, including their education. - A significant drop in the number of out-of-school children and the increasing superior education, timeless learning and impactful educational services.
- The promotion of skills that are profitable, values that are worthy of emulation and education that will stand the test of time, in order to make useful citizens.
What are the Basic Features of Universal Basic Education?
- Access to Basic Education for free.
- Mandatory and unrestricted complete years of school education, which includes primary and junior secondary.
- Complete Focus on strengthening the curriculum in a bid to improve reliability and increasing its usefulness for the fulfilment of the desires and goals of the individuals and the entire society.
- Show significant difference between both sections of secondary school which are Junior and Senior Secondary.
- Improving access to computer education.
- Seek the constant improvement of professionalism in the teaching profession.
- Help promote good and effective community-school relationships, which will see communities participate more in school decision making.
Importance of Universal Basic Education
The Importance of Universal Basic Education is as follows:
Ensuring Quality Education.
Universal basic education ensures that quality education is provided to its recipients because the curriculum touches on topics that are important to a country’s development and instil in young learners the principles, values, and ideologies of each subject, which will be useful in the country’s administration and development in the long run.
It also provides young students with attitudes and beliefs that will help shape them positively.
Reduction of Gender Inequality.
By providing opportunities for a female child to have that basic education that would help her contribute her quota to the country’s development, universal basic education has helped to reduce the issue of gender inequality in educational attainment.
Because of universal basic education, which has resulted in more educated women, the female child can hold any position in society, whether political or otherwise.
Employment Opportunities.
As schools require teachers to teach in primary and secondary schools, universal basic education has helped to provide jobs, lowering the unemployment rate and contributing to the nation’s economic development.
Reduction of Poverty.
Universal basic education reduces poverty by producing competent and creative individuals who work in some capacity to improve their standard of living.
By being resourceful entrepreneurs, they create jobs that improve the nation’s economic development, and the rate of crime due to a lack of employment is reduced because more people are engaged in something productive, which Universal Basic Education ensures.
MDGs Achievement.
The millennium development goals are goals that every developing country
The main goal of the MDGs is to eradicate poverty and hunger, which are the banes of many developing countries, particularly Nigeria.
Universal basic education contributes to the achievement of the MDGs by providing the educational foundation upon which solutions to social, political, and economic problems are analyzed in a learning environment, and its recipients put the knowledge acquired to good use to ensure a more productive nation. When people are empowered, they are able to live a more comfortable life.
Reduction in Child labour.
Universal basic education contributes to the reduction of child labour by providing free and compulsory education to children aged 6 to 14 years.
When children attend school, there is no need for unnecessary exploitation of a child because the child’s educational right is effectively exercised.
Child labour, which is a major problem in many developing countries, has been brought under control as a result of universal basic education, which has resulted in the fact that children who are supposed to be in school are in school because it is compulsory and free.
Crime Reduction.
Universal basic education aids in the reduction of crime by instilling in individuals the moral values, beliefs, attitudes, and principles that will enable the individual to be resourceful to himself and society.
An educated person would seek out more productive ways to spend his or her time rather than engaging in criminal activity.
Motivation for Students.
Universal basic education has made learning fun, interesting, and free, and with its additional benefits of free feeding and health care, it has made it appealing for children to want to attend school and not be seen roaming the streets, thereby lowering the rate of school dropout in society.
Help to Parents.
Universal basic education has assisted parents in reducing their financial burden because basic education is essentially free, allowing their children to receive a sound and quality education.
Better Healthcare.
Universal basic education benefits the child by providing free food to them. A well-fed child is less likely to become ill, and the universal basic education initiative has helped to ensure that the child’s feeding and health are properly cared for.
Why are so many young people not in school?
Poverty, discrimination, disability, and geographic location are the most significant barriers to school enrollment.
Children and adolescents from the poorest households are three times more likely than children from the richest households to be absent from school.
School is not free in many countries. Tuition, books, supplies, and uniforms must be paid for by parents. Given that one-third of the world’s population lives on less than $2 per day, school is frequently out of reach for many families.
Many of the world’s most vulnerable children, including those living in conflict zones and those with disabilities, are still excluded from education systems.
Over half of the children who are not in school live in conflict zones, and many of them have been displaced from their homes.
How to improve the Universal Basic Education in Nigeria
In order to make the implementation of the Universal Basic Education programme better and more impactful, there must be strategies to guarantee improved outcomes. Here is how the UBE programmes across the federation can be made better:
- Provision of adequate facilities in libraries, laboratory and play area. In primary schools, there seems to be a great deficiency in the area of play materials. This is not supposed to be so because children enrolled in primary schools will need play materials to learn better. With better learning facilities, pupils will be able to explore their environment and produce productive learning outcomes.
- Governments at various levels should put in place a monitoring team to ensure that funds channelled to the programmes are properly used. Corruption and embezzlement can ultimately cripple the programme and render it a failure.
- Another problem plaguing the effective implementation of the Universal Basic Education programme is inadequate manpower. Government should put in place a framework to improve recruitment and staff competencies.
NB; Universal basic education is critical because it is the solution to all developing countries’ problems and the tool required to advance a nation’s development.
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