A RESEARCH ON GIRLS' RETENTION IN SECONDARY SCHOOLS CASE STUDY: GLOUCESTER VILLAGE SIERRA LEONE

Accounting

In Sierra Leone, there are reports of increased dropout rates mostly among girls in public secondary schools. Many of them drop out of school just before they make the transition to secondary school while others drop out around grade 9. Consequently, there is a hindrance to the Human resource capacity of the country. The failure to take measures to secure girls’ retention and completion in secondary schools will certainly hamper the future of the society as female are the first line of educators in the family and they constitute almost half of the population (49.7) in Sierra Leone, as reported in the Sierra Leone National census in 2008. According to the Sierra Leone school census of 2013, More than 60% school aged children are out-of-school due to parental poverty and government inability to provide the much needed resources to improve the school system nationwide. Unfortunately, over half of the 60% out of school children are girls. In an effort to promote and increase equal access for girls in Education, the GOL launched its Girls’ Education Policy in 2006 through which free and compulsory education was launched for upper and lower basic education (Grade 1-9). In addition, the National Policy was revised in order to make provision for and capture new trends in Girls’ Education related issues. However, in spite of many interventions aimed at promoting equal access for girls, girls’ transition to and retention in secondary schools has become a major issue across counties in Sierra Leone. In lieu of the above, this paper sort to explore factors inhibiting girls’ retention in secondary schools in Sierra Leone and come up with solid policy recommendations to help curb the situation. In doing so, extensive literatures were reviewed to gain an insight on the subject matter. Following the literatures, a research design was done in view to solicit information from respondents at the target schools. An interview was conducted with some key stake holders . In the results from our exploration, we discovered that initiation rites particularly the Female Genital mutilation, early marriages, parental attitude towards female students in comparison to boy child in traditional view, the roles in the community and household chores and finally the poverty that has to do with paying of school fees for the girl-child in secondary schools among several other factors are responsible for the low retention rate of girl child in secondary schools. The study also investigated the government’s efforts put in place to curb the challenges of female retention in secondary schools through the provision of supports. The findings of this study are significant to all stakeholders involved in education sector, political leaders, and policy makers. Both effective leadership and enormous resources are necessary to bolster the effort of girl-child in secondary education and all stakeholders must play their rightful roles if any meaningful gain is to be made in empowerment of the girl-child Education in Sierra Leone. The findings of this study have therefore provided enough evidence to press upon the government and other players in the education sector to take monitoring and evaluation seriously in order to address the possible factors that affect the girl-child from retention and performance in secondary schools in Sierra Leone.

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