Transforming education for girls in Nigeria and Tanzania (TEGINT) : A cross country analysis of baseline research

This report analyses data from the Baseline Study conducted for the Transforming Education for Girls in Nigeria and Tanzania (TEGINT) project between 2007 and 2009. The study sought to identify key aspects of gendered, educational and socio-economic processes and conditions that affect education for girls in Tanzania and Nigeria. Data was collected from survey interviews and questionnaires distributed to 1,053 respondents from 57 schools in six districts of Northern Tanzania and 1,735 respondents from 72 schools in eight states of Northern Nigeria in 2008. Follow-up in-depth interviews were carried out at 14 schools in Tanzania and 16 schools in Nigeria in 2009. Administrative data from school records was collated in 2008 and 2009 and a range of observations were made of school facilities. The study found that girls have high aspirations for their education in both Northern Tanzania and Northern Nigeria. Poverty, gendered division of labour, pregnancy and child marriage are amongst some of the key obstacles articulated by girls that could prevent them from achieving their aspirations. Girls are more able to identify more political, longer-term solutions (e.g. abolishing fees and levies) in areas of relative inequality compared to areas of absolute poverty. Women are underrepresented on school governing committees in Tanzania, but much more so in Nigeria where many committees had no female membership in 2008. Higher levels of female membership seem to translate into higher gender parity in enrolment, attendance, progression and completion at schools in Tanzania, with a weaker relationship in Nigeria, perhaps because so many committees were not active at the time of the study. Girls widely reported violence in the study, but action was either not taken or was rarely in the best interests of the girls. There are troubling silences, gender, generation and school-community gaps in responding to the needs of girls in school. Two new composite gender indicators, developed for the Transforming Education for Girls project, shed new light on issues of gender and schooling: the gender profile score (measures girls opportunities and outcomes relative to boys using enrolment, attendance, progression and attainment data) and the gender management profile score (measures teacher training, school outreach, SMC training and monitoring)