The Kaduna State Government has directed all public schools in the state to start operating four days a week to enable workers to focus on agriculture.
Although the state is being ravaged by banditry, kidnappings and killings, the state government claimed that the new policy was aimed at enhancing productivity as it would allow workers to focus on their families, and improve work-life balance.
The directive was given on Sunday by the Commissioner for Education, Halima Lawal, in a notice for school resumption for the second term of the new academic session.
Lawal also advised school administrators to be security conscious and promptly report any security threats in their schools.
She stated that the academic calendar would be adjusted to ensure coverage of the curriculum for the academic session.
Recall that on December 1, the Kaduna State government begun the transition to a four-day working week.
The government argued that the new measure would eventually affect the organised private sector in the state.
The state had also been bedevilled by bandits’ attacks on schools.
On July 5, 2021, bandits invaded Bethel Baptist school located at Maraban Damishi under Chikun Local Government Area of Kaduna and kidnapped 121 students.
At least 1200 students including those attending higher institutions were abducted in coordinated attacks on schools in mostly Northern states in 2021.
Some of the schools, which witnessed attacks, include Government Science College, Kagara, Niger; Government Girls Secondary School, Jangebe in Zamfara; Bethel Baptist High School; Federal College of Forestry Mechanisation and Greenfield University, all in Kaduna State.
