Age and level of education in Nigeria
According to data from a Demographic and Health Survey (DHS) that was conducted in Nigeria in 2003, 60.1% of all children of primary school age were attending primary school at the time of the survey. Among children of secondary school age, 35.1% were attending secondary school . These primary and secondary school net attendance rates hide the fact that many children are in school at a level that is not appropriate for their age. In Nigeria, children often enter school at an advanced age and leave school well past the official graduation age. The primary school age in Nigeria is 6 to 11 years and the secondary school age 12 to 17 years. The graph below indicates the level of school attended for all Nigerians between 5 and 24 years of age. The data from the 2003 DHS survey reveals that a small percentage of Nigerians are still in primary school when they are already 20 years old. Secondary school attendance continues past 24 years of age, the highest age for which the DHS has data on ...