ASSESSMENT OF FUNCTIONAL LITERACY PROGRAMMES FOR WOMEN EMPOWERMENT IN CROSS RIVER STATE, NIGERIA

ABSTRACT

The study was carried out to assess the functionality of literacy programmes for women empowerment in Cross River State, Nigeria. In carrying out the study, three research questions and three null hypotheses were developed to guide the study. The study adopted survey research design. The Population of the study comprises of 19,256 women that enrolled in functional literacy programmes in Cross River State. The sample of the study was 750 women. The instrument for data collection was a 32-item structured questionnaire titled: Assessment of Functional Literacy Programmes for Women Empowerment in Cross River State Questionnaire (AFLPWECRSQ). The instrument for the study was face validated by three experts. The internal consistency of the instrument was established using Cronbach Alpha reliability method which yielded coefficients of 0.65 for vocational skills, 0.59 for basic health practices and 0.65 for ICT skills for empowering women. The data for the study were collected with the help of 9 research assistants. The 721 copies of the questionnaire administered to the respondents, were completely filled and retrieved representing 100 % rate of return. The data collected were analysed using mean and standard deviation for answering the research questions while t-test statistics was used to test the null hypotheses at 0.05 level of significance. Based on the data analysed, the study found that vocational skills, basic health practices and Information and Communication Technology (ICT) skills are to a low extent provided in the vocational centres for empowering the women in Cross River State. There were significant (p<0.05) differences in the mean ratings of the responses of urban and rural women on 16 out of the 32 items whereas there were no significant (p<0.05) differences on the remaining 16 items. Based on the above findings, the study among others recommended that government should improve the physical, infrastructural and organizational standards of vocational institutions for women empowerment through better funding, increase involvement of international donor agencies in the health intervention programmes for improved health services for women and that women should be encouraged to form cooperative societies so that they can be trained and empowered as a group with relevant vocational, health and ICT skills for productive living.

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

1.1 Background to the Study

In African countries Like Nigeria , Education is a very important tool for individual growth, poverty reduction, and social change. With women, education goes beyond just reading and writing. It brings opportunities for women to learn useful skills, achieve economic empowerment, make decisions, and contribute to community development. The need for functional literacy among women in developing countries like Nigeria is very important, as many may not have attended school before or need additional knowledge and skills to improve their lives.

In contrast, functional literacy is related to putting literacy numeracy writing and other skills into practice in everyday life. Unlike literacy, which is the knowledge of basic reading and writing skills, we say that someone is functionally literate when they are able to put this knowledge into practice on issues such as earning a living, the related issues of health and healthcare, family life agriculture civic participation and technology. As the UNESCO Institute for Lifelong Learning, adult learning and education are seen as important element of lifelong learning and development (UNESCO Institute for Lifelong Learning, 2009). In Nigeria, adults', and non-formal education programmes focus on critical elements of literacy and basic numeracy skills with vocational and health training (Federal Ministry of Education, 2017).

Women’s empowerment involves strengthening the power of women to exercise meaningful choices and control over resources and decision making which affects them., empowerment could be defined in terms of the interrelated concepts of resources, agency, and achievements. Resources encompass areas like education, economic resources, and possession of productive resources; agency means the ability to define one’s goal and work towards it; and achievements mean outcomes from such an endeavor. From this perspective, functional literacy could be seen as empowering women through knowledge, confidence, occupational skills, and decision making..

The need for adult literacy programmes in Nigeria is correlated with disparities in access to education poverty unemployment and the discrimination of some women in the economy and society. The National Commission for Mass Literacy, Adult, and Non-Formal Education has been intensifying programmes for adult education, for those who have been denied the opportunity of a formal education. As the Nigerian policy guidelines for mass literacy and non-formal education, the implementation of such programmes should include reducing regional, gender, and socio-economic inequality (Federal Ministry of Education, 2017). But, such a policy or learning centre cannot be viewed as concrete evidence that adult learners have gained relevant skills or their living standards have been improved.

Nigeria offers an interesting case in which areas such as Calabar offer an appropriate example through which these questions can be considered in relation to the fact that adult literacy programs can be used for educating women in agriculture, trade, crafts, small businesses and housework activities. In each of these cases, women may need literacy programs that will consider their occupation, languages, time availability and economics. The programs that include reading, numeracy, vocational skills, health education and ICT can be of special importance if knowledge acquired is applicable to life situations.

There is some evidence from the research done in the state for the importance of observing programme implementation. Asor, Akpama, and Erim (2016) examined community institutional and organizational resource use in adult basic and functional literacy (ABFL) programmes in Cross River State. They found out that community institutional and organizational resources affected programme implementation. This may imply that community facilities and local organizations as well as institutional supports are germane to the delivery of adult literacy education.

Similarly, evaluation of adult basic literacy programmes in calabar  reveals that absence of educational materials was a barrier to the success of the programme (Bessong et al., 2021). This may tend to restrict the instructional focus and the application of the learned skills. Therefore, from this, the assessment of the functional literacy programme should be based on enrolment as well as ways of teaching and availability of educational materials.

Functional literacy could aid women in business accounting computation communication, health knowledge, and membership in various association groups. It should still, not be assumed that all women who attend literacy lessons will benefit from these benefits. Any program that is going to be successful will have to take into account the needs of the learners, have accessibility to it, and allow the learning to be put into practice. As Yusuf and Sholagberu (2017) reported, adult literacy services, like functional civic family and post- literacy education may act as tools for the empowerment of rural women in Nigeria.

In the light of the above, the current research aims to evaluate the impact of functional literacy programs on women’s empowerment in Cross River State. In particular, attention is paid to skills in vocational activities, basic health, and ICT, as these areas are essential in the process of realizing the benefits from literacy training programs in women’s lives. At the same time, these aspects allow for the evaluation of the differences in the impact of program benefits among urban and rural women. Such evaluation will be necessary to recognize the advantages and potential for improvement of functional literacy programs.