Throughout 2012, across states, governors were swinging sledge hammers on teachers. They seemed to have woken- quite suddenly- from a deep slumber to realize that the major reason why thousands of students were performing woefully in final year public examinations conducted by WAEC and NECO was perhaps because even their teachers needed proper schooling.
From Bauchi, Gombe, Kogi, Ondo, Edo to mention a few the tsunami raged on. A rough collation of reported figures reveals that since 2012 leading to February this year, across some states 3,170 ghost teachers were discovered, while ,274 others forged their certificates. The record also revealed that a staggering 6,502 were unqualified.
But the latest revelation of the depth of rot in the basic education sub-sector in some states was reported in Kaduna state two weeks ago. 1,300 teachers failed the same tests administered to primary four pupils. Of the total 1,599 teachers who sat for the examination only one of them scored 75 percent, 250 scored between 50 to 75 percent and 1,300 scored below 25 percent.
These tests were just a follow-up to an earlier statement by the late Governor Patrick Yakowa November last year that no fewer than 2,000 teachers had been discovered with fake certificates and the Chairman of the Kaduna state House of Assembly on education Yunusa Mohammad who said that out of the 36,000 teachers in the state, 15,000 were not qualified.
It was not the first time teachers were failing such a test in Nigeria. In 2008, Kwara state government administered the same primary four examinations to 19,125 teachers and out of the 259 who scored zero, 10 of them possessed university degrees.
Governor Kayode Fayemi administered a similar test on 500 school principals who failed woefully and have since been reduced to either classroom teachers or demoted to vice-principals in rural schools.
But the big question is ‘why are there so many unqualified teachers in public schools?’ State officials are quick to point accusing fingers at the education secretaries of local government areas for dashing teaching appointments based on political patronage and not competence.
However, very little funding if any at all, is budgeted for training and capacity building of the few qualified teachers. In Kaduna state for example, the government spent N3.6bn on projects in the education sector last year. Emphasis was placed on renovation of schools infrastructures, payment of scholarships, construction works in its state tertiary institutions, purchase of equipment, boreholes, furniture but no major funds are allocated for the training of teachers.
In Bauchi where only 7,000 of the 17,000 teachers on its payroll are qualified, the Chairman of the Bauchi State Universal Basic Education Board (SUBEB) Alhaji Abdullahi Dabo was quoted to have said, “Government has provided enough text books and other teaching materials, yet the end result is poor due to unqualified teachers.”
Bauchi claims increase in budgetary allocation to the education sector has led to increase in budget performance by 83 percent. But in an article written by the Chief Press Secretary to the Governor Michael Ishola on 31st October 2012, only 125 teachers of the 17,000 in the state participated in national training programmes. 25 Chemistry teachers at the National Research and Chemical Technology Institute Zaria, 40 Mathematics teachers under the National Mathematical Centre and 60 teachers from Federal Science Equipment Centre.
Cumulative spending on teacher trainings in all 36 states including the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) does not in any way compete with the N11.5billion spent by federal government through the National Teachers Institute (NTI) on the training of 425,000 teachers in the last four years.
This training however takes place only once a year. Director General of NTI, Dr. Ladan Sharehu attributes the growing numbers of unqualified teachers to three problems: lack of training, non-upgrade of academic qualifications and poor remuneration.
Sharehu said most teachers rely on the yearly training conducted by the NTI when ideally a teacher ought to be trained at least three times a year.
“As a teacher if you do not keep updating yourself you could become stagnated. If you expect quality in teachers they should be trained at least three times in a year. But you have teachers in states who have not had opportunity to participate in workshops, conferences in the several years they have been teaching. The states are trying but they need to do more. Some of them employ questionable consultants to do this training when NTI has the capacity. We have been around for over 35 years, we have special manuals, let every state government bring out money and partner with us.”
He said teachers need to be encouraged to continue to update and upgrade their academic qualification as “a teacher cannot have just one qualification throughout his career.”
His words: “ You need to upgrade your qualification and that is the difference between teachers in the basic education sub-sector and tertiary education. At tertiary education level the lecturers are encouraged to improve themselves but that is lacking for primary and secondary school teachers.”
He said the yearly training programme funded by federal government ought to be “a model for states to key into” but most states would rather engage Colleges of Education to conduct capacity building for their teachers when their mandate is for academic training.
“If every state would borrow leaf from federal government this problem would not persist. But because most states do not see results when they train teachers they are not encouraged to invest in the training of teachers. They’d rather build structures when the teachers are not qualified. But qualified teachers who teach under trees would make greater impact on children.”
One of the mandates of the Teachers Registration Council of Nigeria (TRCN) is the registration and licensing of qualified teachers. So far teachers who have registered with the council are “slightly above one million”, according to the Principal Public Relations Officer of the council, Ojewuyi Olumuyiwa.
The scope of its mandate does not cover unqualified teachers. “If they are unqualified that means they don’t fall within the settings we work with. We deal with qualified teachers, we register qualified teachers. And we have a right to de-license any registered teacher who is involved in any misconduct.”
But what happens when the unqualified teachers far outnumbers those who are qualified? Olumuyiwa said the number of unlicensed teachers within the system is a major issue.
“We are expected to fish them out from the school system with the help of the Federal Ministry of Justice. There are some documentations that we need to get to be able to effect that but these papers are not yet in place that’s why we cannot act.”
Again in some states where governments have threatened to sack unqualified teachers or subject them to tests, the local unions have fought to resist such actions. Do they have the blessings of their national body, the Nigeria Union of Teachers? Not necessarily.
NUT President Michael Olukoya said the preferable scenario would be for the teachers to have gained the necessary exposure before applying for employment but the states have to consider the economic point of view.
Olukoya said the union has always encouraged its members to upgrade themselves.
He said, “ So let the affected state governments provide the enabling environment for them to further their education so the quality of service they would be giving to the people there would be of high. The affected teachers should make use of distance learning, weekend courses and sandwich programmes to upgrade themselves.”
But the latest revelation of the depth of rot in the basic education sub-sector in some states was reported in Kaduna state two weeks ago. 1,300 teachers failed the same tests administered to primary four pupils. Of the total 1,599 teachers who sat for the examination only one of them scored 75 percent, 250 scored between 50 to 75 percent and 1,300 scored below 25 percent.
These tests were just a follow-up to an earlier statement by the late Governor Patrick Yakowa November last year that no fewer than 2,000 teachers had been discovered with fake certificates and the Chairman of the Kaduna state House of Assembly on education Yunusa Mohammad who said that out of the 36,000 teachers in the state, 15,000 were not qualified.
It was not the first time teachers were failing such a test in Nigeria. In 2008, Kwara state government administered the same primary four examinations to 19,125 teachers and out of the 259 who scored zero, 10 of them possessed university degrees.
Governor Kayode Fayemi administered a similar test on 500 school principals who failed woefully and have since been reduced to either classroom teachers or demoted to vice-principals in rural schools.
But the big question is ‘why are there so many unqualified teachers in public schools?’ State officials are quick to point accusing fingers at the education secretaries of local government areas for dashing teaching appointments based on political patronage and not competence.
However, very little funding if any at all, is budgeted for training and capacity building of the few qualified teachers. In Kaduna state for example, the government spent N3.6bn on projects in the education sector last year. Emphasis was placed on renovation of schools infrastructures, payment of scholarships, construction works in its state tertiary institutions, purchase of equipment, boreholes, furniture but no major funds are allocated for the training of teachers.
In Bauchi where only 7,000 of the 17,000 teachers on its payroll are qualified, the Chairman of the Bauchi State Universal Basic Education Board (SUBEB) Alhaji Abdullahi Dabo was quoted to have said, “Government has provided enough text books and other teaching materials, yet the end result is poor due to unqualified teachers.”
Bauchi claims increase in budgetary allocation to the education sector has led to increase in budget performance by 83 percent. But in an article written by the Chief Press Secretary to the Governor Michael Ishola on 31st October 2012, only 125 teachers of the 17,000 in the state participated in national training programmes. 25 Chemistry teachers at the National Research and Chemical Technology Institute Zaria, 40 Mathematics teachers under the National Mathematical Centre and 60 teachers from Federal Science Equipment Centre.
Cumulative spending on teacher trainings in all 36 states including the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) does not in any way compete with the N11.5billion spent by federal government through the National Teachers Institute (NTI) on the training of 425,000 teachers in the last four years.
This training however takes place only once a year. Director General of NTI, Dr. Ladan Sharehu attributes the growing numbers of unqualified teachers to three problems: lack of training, non-upgrade of academic qualifications and poor remuneration.
Sharehu said most teachers rely on the yearly training conducted by the NTI when ideally a teacher ought to be trained at least three times a year.
“As a teacher if you do not keep updating yourself you could become stagnated. If you expect quality in teachers they should be trained at least three times in a year. But you have teachers in states who have not had opportunity to participate in workshops, conferences in the several years they have been teaching. The states are trying but they need to do more. Some of them employ questionable consultants to do this training when NTI has the capacity. We have been around for over 35 years, we have special manuals, let every state government bring out money and partner with us.”
He said teachers need to be encouraged to continue to update and upgrade their academic qualification as “a teacher cannot have just one qualification throughout his career.”
His words: “ You need to upgrade your qualification and that is the difference between teachers in the basic education sub-sector and tertiary education. At tertiary education level the lecturers are encouraged to improve themselves but that is lacking for primary and secondary school teachers.”
He said the yearly training programme funded by federal government ought to be “a model for states to key into” but most states would rather engage Colleges of Education to conduct capacity building for their teachers when their mandate is for academic training.
“If every state would borrow leaf from federal government this problem would not persist. But because most states do not see results when they train teachers they are not encouraged to invest in the training of teachers. They’d rather build structures when the teachers are not qualified. But qualified teachers who teach under trees would make greater impact on children.”
One of the mandates of the Teachers Registration Council of Nigeria (TRCN) is the registration and licensing of qualified teachers. So far teachers who have registered with the council are “slightly above one million”, according to the Principal Public Relations Officer of the council, Ojewuyi Olumuyiwa.
The scope of its mandate does not cover unqualified teachers. “If they are unqualified that means they don’t fall within the settings we work with. We deal with qualified teachers, we register qualified teachers. And we have a right to de-license any registered teacher who is involved in any misconduct.”
But what happens when the unqualified teachers far outnumbers those who are qualified? Olumuyiwa said the number of unlicensed teachers within the system is a major issue.
“We are expected to fish them out from the school system with the help of the Federal Ministry of Justice. There are some documentations that we need to get to be able to effect that but these papers are not yet in place that’s why we cannot act.”
Again in some states where governments have threatened to sack unqualified teachers or subject them to tests, the local unions have fought to resist such actions. Do they have the blessings of their national body, the Nigeria Union of Teachers? Not necessarily.
NUT President Michael Olukoya said the preferable scenario would be for the teachers to have gained the necessary exposure before applying for employment but the states have to consider the economic point of view.
Olukoya said the union has always encouraged its members to upgrade themselves.
He said, “ So let the affected state governments provide the enabling environment for them to further their education so the quality of service they would be giving to the people there would be of high. The affected teachers should make use of distance learning, weekend courses and sandwich programmes to upgrade themselves.”
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