Higher Education and Gender Equity in South-Western Nigeria

Abstract

Nigeria has made enormous strides towards improving access of boys and girls to education at all levels, and in promoting gender equity within the educational system. Yet girl students continue to lag behind in educational achievement and access, particularly at the secondary and tertiary levels, where girls’ enrolment, completion and achievement rates are lower. Girls are under-represented in government schools, and are instead more likely to attend more expensive and lower quality private schools and universities. Despite an enabling policy environment, a number of social and institutional barriers continue to prevent girls and young women from attending schools and universities and from performing equally to their male classmates. Addressing gender equity in the education system, with a focus on improving girls’ educational performance and outcomes, is crucial to meeting Nigeria’s development goals and to protecting women’s human rights within the country. To this end, this study aims at finding possible solution to gender inequity in the system. The main objective is to analyse the gap between girls and boys enrolment and completion of schools in selected Nigerian public and private Universities. The study relied on secondary data from Ajayi Crowther University vis-à-vis University of Ibadan. The data for enrolment and convocation of male and female university students are collected as well as present the findings and the possible recommendation. The Chi-square and graph used for the study.