In the bilingual high school for girls of Amrighebe, near N’Djamena, Aboubakar Assidick Choroma, Minister of National Education and Civic Promotion of Chad, and Alice Albright, GPE CEO, sat with students in a 10th grade classroom.
The school welcomes 1500 girls and has 80 teachers, including 30 women. It provides education in Arabic and in French.
Alice Albright was in Chad this week to meet with government officials and partners, and pledged to continue GPE’s support to help the country strengthen its education system. The Swiss Cooperation coordinates education partners in Chad, and both UNESCO and UNICEF act as GPE grant agents.
There are vast geographical and social disparities in Chad, and many children, in particular girls, don’t complete school. In the Lake Chad region, GPE and other partners have been supporting education services for refugee children and children from the surrounding communities.
Chad has been a GPE partner since 2012 and has received more than $82 million in grants. The latest grant of $27.8 million supports classroom construction, distribution of textbooks, subsidies for teachers to ease the burden on poor parents of bearing education costs, teacher training, non-formal literacy training for learners aged 15 or older and reintegration of out-of-school children aged 9 to 14.
The grant also aims to improve the national education data information system and strengthen oversight and management capacities of the education ministry.