JICA extends initiative to develop girl’s education in Taiz

JICA efforts pushed the local comity to send their children ,both girls and boys, to the schools.

A girl’s education project supported by Japan’s International Cooperation Agency (JICA) has recorded an increase in enrollment of girls and boys at a number of schools. It has also succeeded in developing public participation, and has boosted the local educational administration’s capacity.

The JICA project extended their Taiz based initiative for bridging girls’ education by holding the project’s final workshop at the Shahran Hotel in Sana’a.  The project lasted for 42 months, and will end in November 2008 in Sana’a. The workshop aims to allow participants to share their experiences.

According to the organization, there were 120 prominent participants, including the Minister of Education Dr. Abulsalam al-Jufi, the Deputy Minister of Education Fuzia Noman, the Taiz Bridge Project team , educational office managers, the governorate’s girl’s education administrators, and donors. 

The organization distributed the Bridge Directory, which outlines a plan for comprehensive school improvement with a special focus on encouraging girl’s education at the basic level. 

The organization says the Directory is one of the project’s most important achievements because Taiz governorate presents the success they have achieved, the benefits, and their plan for extending the project. The Taiz teams shared their experiences and the changes that have occurred since implementing the bridge project.

The organization said the bridge project allowed contracted teachers from the local community who held at least a general secondary school certificate, giving priority to females when local male and female applicants’ skills were equal. 58 out of 59 contracted teachers in 172 targeted schools in 2007 were female.   The female teachers became a model for the schools’ female students because they highlighted the benefits of education, and encouraged parents to send their girls to school . The male teachers also played an important role because skillful teachers are hard to find in remote areas.

The organization said male teachers would be permitted to teach female students if they were from the same community. The schools sought to contract female teachers from outside the areas of the schools, but they were faced with expensive housing and transport problems, whereas the local teacher did not need lodging or transport. 

JICA build many schools in Taiz rural, this school one of them

The project hoped to increase enrollment in 59 schools, and succeeded by increasing the number of females in schools from 6,080 in 2004 to 9,307 in 2007. The male enrollment increased from 9,312 in 2004 to 11,958.  The bridge project helped increase total student enrolment, with the girls’ rate rising from 0.65 to 0.78 in 2007. (JICA 2008)  The JICA project also contributed to school environment improvement by providing direct deposits into school bank accounts.

JICA donated YR 84.5 million in a three-year period from 2005-2007. The local councils provided YR 16.8 million in 2007, in addition to the local community which furnished YR 7.6 million during the three years. The bridge project’s characteristics combine comprehensive school improvement and community awareness promotion. It opened new schools and courses for literacy and sewing classes for mothers to encourage them to learn. This helped mothers understand the school’s role for their girls, and helped dropouts resume their education.

The project held the so-called Community Leaders’ Initiative and the Mothers’ Initiative for discussing the role of the school’s community in attracting female students. The project also helped local communities take practical measures regarding the schools.

The school managers and the community leaders encouraged women’s participation in the school’s projects and activities, which took place step by step.

Taiz governorate started implementing the bridge project in 2007. They provided YR 230,000 to each of the JICA targeted schools in 2008, which were successfully managed by Education Ministry teams. Taiz governorate plans to extend the project to an extra 60 schools by adding 3 other districts. Dr. Mahdi Ali Abdulsalam, Taiz educational office manager said, “ The bridge project helped the educational teams in the governorate and the other educational teams in the districts to promote their administrative capacities which included reporting, observation visits for activity follow up, organizing meetings between the schools and the community, helping with women participation in school programs and ultimately the project led to establishing good relations with the local councils’ authorities.”

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