FEMALE – CHILD EDUCATION: A CRITICAL ISSUE FOR NATIONAL DEVELOPMENT IN NIGERIAN

Abbagana K.K.

Department of Educational Foundation and Administration

Federal College of Education, Yola

E-mail: yahyamagaji@gmail.com

ABSTRACT

If you educate a female then you have successfully educated a nation, goes the sayings: so female – child education has become a contemporary issue to nations in the world because girls/women are usually discriminated against in all spheres of life including education. It is based on this, that this paper examines the female – child marginalization and with unequal access to education compared to male counterpart. The study reveals that cultural practices serve as hindrance to female-child education and that inaccessibility of the female – child education  makes  vulnerable  diseases  such  as  HIV/AIDS,  early  marriage,  denial  of fundamental rights and child labour. The paper concluded that if female-child education is fostered, she will be self-reliant, adequately socialize and well empowered to contribute meaningfully  to  the  community  as  well  as  skills  of  problems  solving  to  an  appreciable extent. The paper therefore recommends that education should be made accessible to the female-child  at  all  levels  and  awareness  programme  should  be  mounted  to  redeem  the image of the female-child to make the world a better place for her to live.