More than two million Nigerian children have benefited from a United Kingdom-funded education programme that trained over 25,000 teachers and facilitators, with five northern states now committing to sustain its interventions following its closure.
Kaduna, Kano, Jigawa, Borno and Yobe made the commitment at the conclusion of the Partnership for Learning for All in Nigeria (PLANE), a programme established in 2019 to improve foundational learning and strengthen education delivery, particularly in communities facing barriers to quality schooling.
The programme’s closure places renewed responsibility on the beneficiary states to preserve the improvements in teacher capacity, learning resources, community-based education and child protection developed through the intervention.
Kaduna recorded some of the programme’s detailed outcomes. The state’s Commissioner for Education, Professor Abubakar Sani Sambo, said more than 6,300 teachers and nearly 700 head teachers received training, while 737,000 learning materials were distributed to schools.
He disclosed that 76,125 learners accessed community-based learning, including 40,958 girls and 4,389 children with disabilities. Another 1,345 adolescents participated in life-skills clubs, while 2,811 children received support through child protection interventions.
The programme also supported efforts to return children who had dropped out of formal education to learning. Sambo said more than 25,000 out-of-school children had been reached across Kaduna’s 23 local government areas.
He added that 144 savings groups were established to help families keep their children in school, while improved education data systems and policy support strengthened planning and decision-making within the state.
Sambo said the state government would build on the interventions, describing the progress recorded as a foundation for further improvements in education delivery.
The commitment to sustain the programme was reinforced by education commissioners from the five beneficiary states at the close-out event in Kaduna on Wednesday.
Borno State Commissioner for Education, Abba Wakilbe, said the true value of the initiative would depend on what participating states achieved after its conclusion.
“The legacy of PLANE will not be measured by what it has done, but by what we achieve from it afterwards,” he said.
Kano State Commissioner for Education, Dr Ali Haruna Makoda, commended the programme’s contributions to education development and reported improved performance in National Examinations Council examinations in the state. Yobe State Commissioner for Education, Professor Idris Abba, also acknowledged the programme’s interventions.
The British High Commissioner to Nigeria, Pete Vowles, said PLANE had shown how collaboration among governments, teachers, communities and development partners could improve children’s access to education and strengthen learning outcomes.
He urged Nigerian institutions to take ownership of successful interventions and ensure they continued beyond the programme’s lifespan.
“While we are celebrating the achievements of the programme today, the most important question is what happens next,” Vowles said.
He added that the closure of PLANE would not affect the UK’s wider education partnership with Nigeria.
“PLANE is closing. The UK’s education partnership with Nigeria is not,” he said.
The programme was funded by the UK and implemented by DAI, UNICEF, Save the Children and other consortium partners. Its work covered foundational literacy and numeracy, education in emergencies, community participation, teacher development and stronger child safeguarding systems across the five states and federal education structures.
Kaduna State Deputy Governor, Dr Hadiza Balarabe, who represented Governor Uba Sani at the event, said the programme had worked with public officials and communities, including those in remote areas, to strengthen education delivery.
She expressed confidence that the skills and institutional capacity developed through the intervention would remain valuable after its closure.
Head of Development Cooperation at the British High Commission, Cynthia Rowe, said the programme demonstrated the results that could be achieved when research evidence, innovation and partnerships were directed towards improving education.
She reaffirmed the UK’s interest in continued collaboration with Nigerian governments, schools, universities and communities, including support for young people from foundational learning to advanced skills development.
As part of the activities, UK representatives visited the College of Petroleum and Energy Studies in Kaduna, where Nigerian institutions and UK universities are collaborating to provide students with advanced technical and professional skills.
The end of PLANE marks a transition from externally supported interventions to the responsibility of state institutions to maintain and expand the reforms. For the millions of children reached by the programme, the commitment of the five states will be critical to determining whether its improvements in access, teaching and learning can be sustained.
