Social Innovation Plan for Female Education in Nigeria

This essay discusses the social innovation plan for improving female education in Nigeria, focusing on the problem of gender inequality and the use of human-centered design approach. It explores the mindset and inspiration needed, ideation for promoting education, and the implementation of the plan through building teams, partnerships, funding, and integration of private and public sectors.

Running Head: Social Innovation and Enterprise
Social Innovation and Enterprise
Essay
System04104
4/28/2019

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Social Innovation Plan for Female Education in Nigeria
Education is an important part of human life that builds human capital for any nation.
Education plays a vital role in human development. Education not only widens the thinking
of people rather it also helps in raising the living standard of people. The present work is
based on the human centred design plan and different tools used to present some innovative
ideas for Nigerian government to improve the female education in the country. Nigeria is
facing a huge difference between male and female education in both primary and higher-level
education. The difference between the enrolment of girls and boys education in the country is
a major problem for the Nigerian government and for its education system. This paper
includes various tools of human centred design approach that how the social innovative plan
can be implemented and the problem of poor female education in the country can be solved.
However, the Nigerian government take several steps to overcome this issue but still much
work has to be done in the country to raises the women education standard in the country.
The poverty of people and traditional thinking of society forces the women for domestic
engagements in the house and play a sizeable reproductive role in society. These are the
major reasons why women did not receive significant attention from both government and
society, which led to women been second-class in society. The gender inequality and poor
thinking of society have affected the female education level in Nigeria. As a result, males
dominated over women from primary education level to higher education level.
Problem of Gender Inequality
One of the major problems in Female education in Nigeria is ‘gender inequality’ that
further causes problems for both education and employment opportunities for females. The
gender inequality in society reduces the opportunities for girls and women to participate in
social development and getting education for their own development. It has been seen that
there is limited access to girls in primary education, which is a major problem in the Nigerian
education system. This problem negatively affects the social, economic, and political aspects
of their lives.

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Tool used to solve the problem: Human Centred Design
To Encounter this problem, a human-centred design tool is required for this social
innovation plan depending on the resources and process available to the Nigerian government
to take corrective action to eliminate education barriers in the society.
Mindset and Inspiration
Nigeria is facing problems related to poverty, low level of education, high level of
gender discrimination, and still facing problems with traditional stereotype thinking of
people. Girls face many challenges as they try to access education at both primary and higher
level, for example, low family income, poor economic condition, and living in rural areas
where resources are not available for even living a good life. These problems can be treated
as the barriers between education and social development of the country. Poverty is one of
the major causes of illiteracy and unemployment in women and young girls.
Changing the Mindset of Society: Various studies found that the literacy rate in girls
is directly linked with the social, religious, and tradition misconceptions of people. People
think that girls cannot access education in that same ways, as boys do. Therefore, changing
the mindset of people is most necessary step to resolve the issue of girl education. People live
in Nigeria with a very traditional biased view about girls. Child marriage is also a critical
challenge in Nigeria because child bribes are much more likely to drop out of schools or even
they not attend the school in entire life. It not only affects the health of girl child rather it also
affects their ability to work or receiving education adult age. The misconception of people is
a major obstacle in Nigeria girl education standards. The problem of gender discrimination
and child marriage are the cause of stereotype thinking which is directly linked with female
illiteracy and low-level involvement of girls in schools and universities. This could be change
by changing the perception of people, educate them about the importance of girl education
and unite them for same purpose. The government should try to change the mindset of people
by educating them about the role of female in the society.
Motivation: The government should motivate the people in the society and encourage
them to be a part of girl education. The government should focus on providing free education
for girls and should try to provide them all the basic education material like books, dress, and
even mid-day meals for students in both primary and higher secondary education. This step
of government motivates people and encourage them towards girl education. Even the poor

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people can access the free books and their girl child can get free mid-day meal facilities. It
motivates poor people who are worried about their girl education. The mid-day meal system
can motivate the poor girls as well.
Create Confidence: The Government should try to create confidence in poor people.
Girls will join the school for both the mid-day meal and school education if they will be
supported from the society and their families. The government should provide employment
opportunities for unemployed parents and people that helps to boost their confidence, that
they can educate their children. Actually, boosting confidence in people is a major human
cantered approach to solve any problem. If people will be motivated by government and
encouraged by the Nigerian government, they will definitely send their daughters to school
(Chahine, 2016).
Ideation
Promoting primary and higher education in society is essential for both men and
women and it is important for social development and for overall national development. To
solve this problem creation of ideas is essential in any social innovative plan. Changing the
mindset and thinking of people is crucial of this innovative plan, because without changing
the perception of people, we cannot do anything. If the government reserve the seats for
female education and ask them to come to schools and take their own right of education, it
will definitely change the mindset of people in the society and it inspire other female to
continue their education, because government is supporting them with free study materials.
However, Improving the female education is not possible without working on providing basic
facilities like food and clothes for females and changing the mindset of people. The
government can improve primary education by launching mid-day meal programs in rural
areas where people cannot even arrange for their foods. The government should provide free
meals, books, and clothes for girls and encourage them to continue their study. However, the
number of teachers in primary schools is also a major problem for the country. The
government should appoint teachers for primary schools and provide them with training that
how they can improve the girl education standard in the country.
Apart from this, if government appoints a female education motivator speaker who
can motivate the girls and women in society towards taking primary and secondary education,
it also changes the mindset of people in the society. However, government can use the tool of

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increasing confidence of girls and females that they can serve the society with men
(DEO.org, 2015). Government can enhance the understanding of people by giving them
appropriate reason to move on with girl education.
Implementation of Plan
Building Teams: To educate people and changing their mindset it is necessary to
build a team that will be the group of great professional and teachers who will help the poo
people to understand the importance of girl education in society. Parents marriage the girl in
the very early age of the life and she will then unable to attend the education as husband and
people in the society treated them as a means of reproduction and managing the household
works only. This concept should be change in early step and this mindset can also be change.
The team can educate and encourage people that the age of marriage of a girt should not be
less than 18 years.
Building Partnership: Apart from this, the Nigerian government can conduct various
social awareness programs through NGO's and other government organisation to educate
people in society about the importance of girl education and disadvantages of early child
marriage. NGO and private sector organisation should take initiation to aware people that
how they can educate their girls that help to build their own nation. The government should
involve all the private sector organisation to donate some funds for girl education in the
country. This step helps the country to deal with the financial crisis and provide financial
resources to the government for improving the standard of girl education in the country. The
Nigerian government can divide the revenue funds in both state and central-level education
development funds. The government can also assign responsibility to each state to achieve a
certain level of girl’s enrolment in schools and colleges and set the accountability of the
bureaucrats for achieving the target.
Funding: Statistics show that more than 131 million children all over the world have
had no access to primary education and among them 81 million were girls. This same
problem exists in Nigeria, where more than 4.5 million girls and more than 4 million boys
were still out of education. These stats show the poor primary education in Nigeria and it also
shows the failure of the government to improve its education system. It needed more funding

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and resources to improve this poor unstructured education system un Nigeria. The Nigerian
government can ask the help for funding and resources that can help the country to improve
the girl education in the country from the following international organisation: WHO,
UNICEF, IMF and World Bank are some world organisation that helps these types of poor
countries for raising education and health standards. Actually currently, these all world
organisations are still helping Nigeria for eliminating poverty from the country and for
improving its living standards (Chahine, 2016).
Integration of private and Public sector organisation: Nigeria is a poor country
and currently facing a huge economic and financial problem. Building, testing and iterating
of plan can help to generate other ideas that helps to find out more relevant solution of the
problem. It is tough for a poor country to raise funds for such a huge plan and every year it
can invest the so much amount on education of girls. Thus, iteration of plan and idea helps to
save money and funds for the same project, but it helps to generate new ideas. Although
Nigeria imposed taxes on private sectors, but the government should force the private
organisation to give an extra 1% tax from their annual incomes for girl education. The
government can bring a law for every organisation that they must involve in any girl
education programs. The tax can be little more for the international MNCs which operates
their business in the country. The Nigerian government can impose 1.5% taxes on the annual
income of MNC's company because their earnings also calculate in huge amounts.
The government should also ensure a proper regulatory environment that can build a
stronger schooling system for girl education. If the teachers give education to these girls
about the importance of education in female, it will further help to improve their thinking
about education and they promote the education in next their generation and send their own
child to schools. However, the importance of parent's education is also important because if
parents knew the importance of girl education it will help to promote female education in
society. Therefore, the government can also promote adult education in society that helps to
enhance the standard of female education.
Iterative approach: To insure the success of plan the focus of human centred design
should be on integrative approach. It has been seen that Nigeria mostly invest in higher
education and not much invested in primary education. This is a major problem because if a
country does not work on basic education then how the country can improve the overall
education structure in the country. It has been seen that people in Nigeria still not so convince

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about sending their female children for higher education. This can only be improved if the
government can launch various adult education programs and aware the parents about the
role of education in a girl’s life. The government can involve government and non-
government organisation to campaign for adult education and improving awareness among
people about girl education. However, the government can put in place programs and
activities to promote girl education in society. The government should aware of the parents
that there will be no charge of providing education to their girls and the government will also
arrange their foods and clothes. This approach of government takes away the excuses of
people being unable to end their girl children to schools because of money and poverty. The
government can also approach the private sectors for conducting such programs and provide
funding from their incomes to girl education. This plan will eliminate the financial issue of
government to some extent (Stroh, 2015).
These tools of human cantered design approach can help the Nigerian government to
promote the girls education in the country. The human-centred design approach helps to find
out creative and more innovative solution of any problem. If the Nigerian government
implement these social innovative plans with human cantered design approach, the situation
of women and girls can be benefited in terms of education, higher living standards and
enjoying their freedom in the society. After implementing these ideas, they might have a
chance to get a better life. The implementation of the plan may help them to get a happier and
healthier life. The social building and human development in society can be possible if both
boys and girls are getting an education with the same equality. These human centred design
approach in the implementation of social innovative ideas help the country to grow and
develop as an educated nation. Education girl-child is an essential step in the process of
enabling her to take care of her own life and it cannot be possible without the equal support
of society. Gender inequality and poverty is a major problem in girl education in Nigeria and
if government adopt such plans and changing the mindset of people, it might help the country
to overcome both economic and social development issues.

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References
Chahine, T. (2016). Introduction to social entrepreneurship. Florida, United States: CRC
Press.
DEO.org (2015) The Field Guide to Human-Centered Design, IDEO [online]. Retrieve from:
http://bestgraz.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/Field-Guide-to-Human-Centered-
Design_IDEOorg.pdf.
Stroh, D. P. (2015). Systems thinking for social change: A practical guide to solving complex
problems, avoiding unintended consequences, and achieving lasting results. USA:
Chelsea Green Publishing.