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We’ll Include GBV, Sexual Health Right In Education Curriculum– NERDC

The Nigerian Educational Research and Development Council (NERDC) says it will include Gender Based Violence and sexual reproductive health rights in its Family Life and HIV/AIDS Education (FLHE) curriculum.
The Secretary of the Council, Prof. Ismail Junaidu, made this known during a planning and writing workshop for the review of FLHE curriculum in Mararaba Nasarawa State.
Represented by the Director, Special Programmes of NERDC, Dr David Omole, Junaid said that the move was in collaboration with the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) and other key stakeholders.
He said that there was the need to redress the FLHE curriculum for basic education saying that the existing one was developed in 2003 and added that the new one would capture prevailing issues affecting the society.
He said: “Going by the current trend in Nigeria, there are many emerging issues that need to be addressed in the FLHE curriculum. There is also the need to adjust some existing contents and concepts to reflect the present situation in our society.
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“The family life and HIV/AIDS Education is very central and invaluable in sharpening and helping to checkmate the scourge of HIV/AIDS, violence against women and girls, rape and child-marriage and other socio-cultural practices that affect the wellbeing of women and girls.”
He, therefore, urged the participants to evolve modalities for the review of the curriculum, select topics and contents that would be used for the exercise, and write the curriculum based on the selected topics.
Speaking, the Spotlight Project Manager in UNESCO, Dr Steven Onyekwelu, said that the workshop was a platform to review the national basic and secondary education curriculum to include prevailing issues affecting the society.
Onyekwelu said that the review would include issues relating to ending violence against women and girls, sexual and reproductive health rights and harmful practices.
