THE USE OF GIS AS EDUCATIONAL DECISION SUPPORT SYSTEM (EDSS) FOR PRIMARY SCHOOLS IN FAGGE LOCALGOVERNMENT AREA OF KANO STATE, NIGERIA

This paper analysed the spatial distribution of Primary schools in the area and the objectives are to make an inventory of the schools in the area, to create a geo-database of the schools in the area and to analyse the pattern of the schools in the area. About 30% of the Primary schools in the urban areas run double shift, There are over 2 million Primary School children in Kano State (47.7% female and 52.3% male), the primary school teacher ratio is 42 pupils per teacher. Data pertaining the addresses of all the primary schools in the area were sourced at the Ministry of Education Kano State. The coordinates of all the primary schools were taking using Global Position System (Garmin 76csx GPS model) and ArcGIS 9.3 with SPSS was used for the analysis. The analyses shows that the distribution of primary schools in the area is more concentrated in areas around the Fagge A, B and D than areas around Kurna, while the buffer zones shows that schools around Sabon Gari and Fagge are closer to the roads and Markets. The database shows there are 222 classrooms, 12,693 pupils and 558 teachers in the area. The tool of analysis (Nearest Neighbour) was used to analyze the pattern of the distribution and the result shows the value of 2.58 which is dispersed and the correlations indicated the R value of 0.837 and the result shows a perfect significant relationship between the number of teacher and pupils. The paper concluded Thus, the end product of the GIS will be part of an Educational Decision Support System that provides the user with a map of specific region with focus on the schools locations and all related information to assist decision-makers in either expanding current school or suggesting sites for new schools in Fagge and also for student and resources location/allocation. it recommends that some primary schools were over staffed and there is need for the use of GIS in the educational sector for planning.