Choice Is a Privilege: Gender, Education and Nigeria's New Curriculum | Norms Lab Podcast Episode 24

Описание: Nigeria’s new Basic Education Curriculum now requires every student to graduate with at least one practical or trade-related skill, a significant step toward expanding learning pathways and economic opportunity for students across the country.

As this reform takes root, one important question emerges: when girls choose a skill, what shapes how free that choice really feels, especially when it goes against social expectations?

In many Nigerian schools:
Some skills quietly feel “appropriate” for girls
Others are seen astoo masculine or out of place
Parents, teachers, and unspoken social norms shape decisions before a girl even speaks

In this episode of The Norms Lab Podcast, Anjola Ayodele speaks with educationist and Safe Schools expert Blessing Tarfa Mam about:
What this curriculum reform is working to achieve
How gender norms shape students’ realities inside classrooms
What it would actually take for skills education to expand agency for girls
What gives Blessing hope that things are changing

Join us as we reimagine what the freedom of choice truly means amongst gender-biased social norms, as the new education curriculum is implemented.

🎧 Listen on Spotify HERE: https://open.spotify.com/episode/6aey...

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Chapters
00:00:00 – Introduction & Guest Welcome
00:00:55 – Parental Expectations and the Promise of Education
00:03:40 – Gender Norms and Cultural Expectations in Education Choices
00:07:39 – Safety, Male-Dominated Fields & Barriers for Girls in STEM and Technical Careers
00:08:39 – From Education to Employment: Schooling and Economic Independence
00:16:23 – How Do Peer Norms Influence Student’s Decisions?
00:21:17 – What Still Feels Stuck Despite The Curriculum Reform
00:22:38 – Education Reform & Sector-Level Transformation
00:32:25 – Moving from Survival to Fulfillment Through Education

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