The Lagos State Government has assured that the laudable Home Grown Feeding Programme of the APC-led Federal Government would soon commence in the State.
The Deputy Governor, Dr. Idiat Adebule, gave this assurance at the 2018 Ministerial Press Briefing of the Ministry of Education to mark the third year in office of Governor Akinwunmi Ambode’s administration.
Adebule, while noting that the National Home Grown School Feeding Programme (NHGSFP) is yet to commence in Lagos State, revealed that final steps are being put in place to ensure that once the programme takes off, it will run smoothly and hitch-free to cater for the large student population in Lagos.
“Let me state categorically that the number of students in Lagos State schools is about the number of students in five or six States put together. We just have to plan properly to ensure no student is left out.
“I’m happy to announce to you that we have engaged the office in charge at the Federal level, as well as the State Ministries of Agriculture and Health. We are on course.
“Lagos State is not known for a shoddy programme and we are gunning for nothing but the best as you all know that our State is the centre for measuring excellence and we will want to do it in the best way that the motive behind that scheme is achieved,” she declared.
Reeling out achievements in the year under review, Adebule said that the State government awarded car loans to 491 teachers to the tune of about N40 million, adding that N30 million housing loan was approved for 38 teaching staff as a welfare package to increase productivity and inspire better performance.
The Deputy Governor said the various initiatives in the Education sector – Ready-Set-Work, Code-Lagos, Project 350 and the Digital Library – have all recorded remarkable achievements during the period under review.
While the Ready-Set-Work initiative since inception in 2016 has trained 12,500 and will, in 2018, be training 25,000 students, the Code Lagos initiative has trained over 31,000 Lagosians with 364 Coding Centres established in various schools and localities.
On Adult literacy, Adebule said that the centres increased from 250 to 798 with a total enrolment of about 20,488 as at March 2018.
According to Adebule, “The Governor Ambode-led administration’s target is to ensure that 95 percent of residents can at least read and write. Our vision is to be a model of excellence in the provision of quality education for the attainment of self-reliance and socio-economic development” she affirmed.
She said the State Government has created an Office of Education Quality Assurance to monitor and evaluate all academic activities in public and private schools while ensuring total compliance with academic standards set by the State government to ensure an environment conducive for learning.
The Deputy Governor added that the initiative has helped to bring significant improvement to learning outcomes as reflected in the better performance of students in both internal and external examinations across the State.
She disclosed that out of a total number of 152,882 public and private school pupils who sat for the Year 2017 Placement Test into public Secondary Schools, a total of 146,116 being 95.61% were successful and offered admission, promising that the State government would not relent in initiating programmes and policies that would continue to improve the standard of education in the State.