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From Sola Ojo, Kaduna
The Kaduna State Government has unveiled its 2025/2026 Annual School Census (ASC) and Out-of-School Children (OOSC) Mapping reports, revealing that 187,719 children remain out of school, with more than 91 percent of affected households blaming poverty as the biggest barrier to education.
The reports, launched on Friday, in Kaduna, provided what the state described as the most comprehensive education database to drive targeted interventions, teacher deployment, school construction and budget planning.
Deputy Governor, Dr. Hadiza Balarabe said the findings would enable the government to identify where out-of-school children live and deploy resources where they are most needed.
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She noted that education received 25 per cent of Kaduna State’s 2026 budget, adding that sustained investments in free basic education, school feeding and other interventions had reduced the number of out-of-school children from over 500,000 to the current 187,719.
“Our decisions must be guided by evidence. These reports provide the data required to ensure that every child, regardless of location or circumstance, has access to quality education,” she said.
Commissioner for Planning and Budget, Mukhtar Ahmad, described the exercise as a demonstration of Kaduna’s commitment to evidence-based planning, transparency and accountability.
Commissioner for Education, Prof. Abubakar Sambo, said the findings would guide teacher recruitment and deployment, infrastructure development and sector planning, adding that preparations for the 2026/2027 Annual School Census had already commenced. He disclosed that Kaduna had been invited to support Nasarawa, Niger and Zamfara states in conducting similar education data exercises. Statistician-General of the Kaduna State Bureau of Statistics, Dr. Baba Alhaji, said the state deployed a digitised Education Management Information System (EMIS) across all 23 local government areas, improving the accuracy, reliability and timeliness of education data.
