Community in Kano operates car wash, other businesses to keep children in school

A community in Gwale Local Government Area of Kano State lunched a car wash business and a commercial borehole as part of its efforts to keep out of school children in school.
According to the Sate Based Management Committee Chairman of Ja’en Special Primary School, Alhaji Kabir Addo, who stated that the business initiative do generate a minimum of N540,000 yearly and the money is use to provide the children with writing materials, school uniforms, bags and other necessities.
Addo said: “We came up with the initiatives after series of trainings by UNICEF and the State Basis Education Board on how to own the GEP3 when donors funding ends. But as you can see we are not waiting for the funding to end before doing what we need to do.
“That was why we opened the car wash, the flower garden, the borehole, even the farm behind the school. At the end of every month we generate nothing less than #45,000 to enable us buy uniforms, books, bags, sandals and other instructional materials to ensure these children are comfortable in school.
“Apart from that, we also have another borehole inside the school compound that the students and staff uses. We also support the school by renovating classrooms, even now we are doing sand filling of the compound because once is raining like this everywhere becomes swamping. This also has generated employment for some young people working here.”
He also pointed out that the SBMC also support the Mothers Association in the school to go out and look for the children, then bring them to school, enjoining other SBMCs in other schools to imbibe this approach to reduce the number of out of school children in the country.
Addo further disclosed that the establishment of the car wash cost the community over N342,000, adding that a total of N1,084,800, have been spent on provision of uniforms, writing materials, fixing of broken desks, sand filling of the compound and other support for the school and the children in the last few months and he call for support of everyone to assist in any way they can as there is need for the children to have more seats.
The Eagle Online reports that in 2009, Kano SUBEB domesticated the National SBMC policy and produced state specific SBMC policy in 2010 with support from Education Sector Support Programme in Nigeria, a DfID funded Project and SBMCs are established by government to act as a bridge between schools and communities and they comprise of 17 members drawn from school pupils and teachers, traditional and religious institutions, artisans, Community Based organizations, school old pupils, women organization based on the State SBMC policy.