Education: Beaming The Searchlight On States

Written By Blogger on Kamis, 25 Juli 2013 | 03.34

The federal government has always borne the brunt of the challenges and rot in the education sector. Critics have done it with so much impunity as if the responsibilities have not been adequately shared by the three tiers of government. In this analysis, KUNI TYESSI tries to charge the states and local councils to live up to responsibility.

More than any time in the past, the officials superintending the education sector have subjected themselves to the highest possible level of scrutiny and accountability. The reason for the continuous high level of accountability stems from the fact that the nation is witnessing the most fundamental level of transformation of the education sector over the past two years.

It goes without saying that education is critical to the nation's development, hence the unprecedented funding and attention that it has received. The strategic funding of the sector has been unprecedented. Even though a lot still needs to be done in terms of funding, education is looking up as a result of the planned and effective implementation of programmes of the administration.

From the very beginning, the federal government declared that it was implementing a four-year strategic plan to revive the nation's education sector. This plan was as a result of several interactions with major stakeholders in the sector and key-points of previous plans that were never implemented by previous administrations.

Increasing access to education at all levels and improving the quality of education available to the Nigerian child were the two focal goals of four year strategic plan of the Federal Ministry of Education. All programmes and projects that are being implemented by the administration revolve around these two all-important goals.

The number of qualified applicants who fail to gain admission into our tertiary institutions due to non-availability of space remains high while the nation has over 10 million out-of- school children.

Funds have been placed at the beck of state governments in form of matching grants in the Universal Basic Education Commission, UBEC, for them to improve facilities in order to accommodate more pupils and eliminate the menace of out-of-school children.

Here lies the dilemma. Ninety five percent of the states are yet to access the funds for 2013, even though their teachers have been capacitated to teach more pupils.

At the June edition of the National Economic Council, NEC, the Federal Ministry of Education presented in very clear language, the poor contributions of states to address the nation's out-of-school children challenge.

It is necessary to give an insight into the massive out-of-school children challenge. In terms of zonal prevalence of out of school children by percentage, North East has 52.5 percent, North West 50.9, North Central 23.5, South-South 9.2, South-East 8.6 and South-West 8.2.

In terms of the spread of the out-of-school children, the North East and East Western states have the highest percentage on state by state basis.

Zamfara has 73.2, Borno, 73.4, Kebbi 69.1, Sokoto 65.3, Jigawa 61.6, Bauchi 58.2 and Katsina 55.1. Niger State tops the list of states with high percentage of out-of-school children in North Central with 50.8 percent. Oyo state has the highest in the Southern region with 20.3percent out-of-school children.

Other States with appreciably high percentage of out-of-school children include; Kano 40, Gombe 38.2, Adamawa 32.9, Taraba 31.9, Kaduna 23. 2, Kwara 23.1, Nasarawa 22.7, while Ebonyi tops the South-East with 18 per cent. The above quoted data are sourced from UNESCO.

The summation of education experts are: the large number of out-of-school children is a threat to social cohesion and active citizenship, it breeds social exclusion and anti-social tendencies amongst youths and adults and it stunts Nigeria's ability to grow socially, economically, politically and maintain global competitive advantage.

At the basic education level, the law provides for compulsory and free primary and junior secondary education of nine years for all children of school going age. This is what the states and local councils must begin to implement religiously, with the media, non governmental organisations playing their important role by holding these tiers of government responsible for the crisis being experienced at this level.

Heaping all manners of blames at the door-steps of the Federal Government when majority of states are not investing in basic education is merely playing the ostrich.

The federal government owns only 104 Federal Government Colleges. The carrying capacity of these schools are extremely limited. About 87,000 pupils from across the nation wrote the last National Common Entrance Examinations, NCEE, into these schools. Even if all these pupils are admitted into these schools, there will still be a very high percentage out-of-school.

However, the children are admitted on the basis of 30 percent for national merit of 150marks, while the remaining 70percent is shared on the equality of the 36 States and Abuja on the premise of state catchment area and environmental factor.

On the strength of the statistics referred to in this piece, it is obvious that the states and local councils need to do more than they are doing at the moment for basic education.

Our attention as stakeholders in the education sector must be focused on the critical issues of access and quality. No child, irrespective of his background, environment and ability must be denied access to basic education. Urgent expansion of facilities and schools must be carried out at the levels of the states and local councils and stakeholders must place these demands as of right.

In conclusion, the most important point that deserves emphasis is the fact that if previous administrations had invested quality resources in the nation's education sector, Nigeria's education would have been in a stable condition.