WAEC,NECO not Responsible for Exams Failure
By Dr. Moses, Adekunle Omoniwa
WE have watched with keen interest Nigerians’ response to the mass failure of Nigerian students in both National Examination Council (NECO) and West African Examination Council (WAEC), especially in the last two or three years. Government officials should know that it is not the major responsibility of the two examination bodies to prepare their candidates for their examinations.
Their responsibility is to prepare the syllabi, provide examination centres, appoint invigilators, mark and release the examination results as quickly as possible. If we can point out from the above where WAEC and NECO have failed, our condemnation in those areas might be justified. Mass failure of public examination can be derived from any or all of the factors discussed below:
Inadequate preparation of candidates: this can be on the part of the candidates or the schools (students) who couldn’t cover the syllabuses (syllabi). For instance in the past three years (in many states) schools have been closed to students for almost six months of twelve months of each year (public schools). If we check very well, most candidates who pass these examinations must be from special and private schools!
Nearly up to 90 percent of the candidates for NECO and WAEC are from the public schools. Teachers may not have gone on strike for lack of patriotism. They may also not go on strike because they did not like their job. Why do the teachers go on strike? Government and their official know this very well, but they hardly talk about it in public. For instance, why should the teachers go on strike before they are paid their salaries, leaves bonuses (which other civil servants earn as at and when due? Why is it that teachers are usually the last to get their salaries of the state’s civil servants in most state of the federation? What are government’s incentives designed to make teachers in primary and secondary schools want to go to rural areas in the state to work? What about schools that do not have teachers at all? How many English and Mathematics teachers do we have in our Secondary schools? What efforts is the state making to train teachers in these subjects and attract them to our schools, especially in the rural areas? This is a problem government has not been given proper consideration at all.
Let us turn to the environment were teachers are expected to perform ‘miracles’: dilapidated school buildings, schools without furniture, schools where the teachers are not provided teachers’ books, which form the basis for drawing their lesson notes, school buildings with partial roofs, windows, and doors, classrooms that their floors are sandy and wet. Some classrooms have no teacher’s tables and chairs; it is common to see teachers sitting on the windows in many primary schools across the country.
Another factor is that parents have stopped purchasing the required books for their children and wards! Each time I travel from Anyigba through Ajaokuta, Okene, and Kabba to lyara and see the children (primary and secondary schools) going to school or coming back from school without their books I am often agonized! Do they leave their books at home or in the schools? What do they study over the weekends? Do they still do assignments these days in our schools? If students stay at home for more than half of the year, what time do the teachers have to cover the syllabus (syllabi) for the public examinations? Do we need any more reasons for mass failure? Do we need more reasons why students cheat in such examinations? Do you want any more reason why the middle-class in Kogi state or in Nigeria does not send their children to public primary and secondary schools? In fact, the trend is beginning to show up in the universities. Rich parents and the fairly well-to-do in the society now prefer to send their children to private universities, where they pay over W350 000 per semester! It is only the poor who send their children and wards to public universities, where a child can spend from 6 - 8yrs to complete a four-year programme of study due to strikes! In private universities, entry and graduation schedules are predictable- students graduate as and when due, except where
the student could not cope academically. Government education policies over the years have been anything but stable and predictable. As I was writing I could not even say the current system of our education system! Frequent migrations have implications for syllabuses, teachers’ orientation/preparation and students learning. We hardly settle on one system before we migrate to another. Unfortunately, the policy makers and implementers never went through that kind of system. We must not shy away from the fact that our teachers today are not as Missionary minded as those of the 1950s, 1960s or even in the 1970s. Many teachers who are teaching in our primary and secondary schools today just cannot see teaching as a vocation or a calling! They all want to receive a large portion (if not all) of their reward here on earth! Teachers today are not different from other civil servants as we all operate in the same economic, political and socio-cultural environment. It will be a great sin or ingratitude by any state or nation if their teachers at any level, cannot educate their own children to the highest level due to poor remuneration and failure to pay their salaries and other entitlements as and when due. Any state or nation that does that may attract the wrath of God. What is required is justice or equity. If we say teachers’ rewards are in heaven, what about the other civil servants? Are we saying they will not have any rewards in heaven? Or that heaven is made only for teachers?
How do we bring sanity back to our education system and the teaching profession? This requires almost a revolution! There is a need to overhaul the present education system, in terms of providing the physical infrastructure and providing the necessary incentives and conditions of service for our teachers.
The situation is redeemable! We need to start from the primary schools. It is the foundation; the Bible says, if the foundation is destroyed the righteous can do nothing! Our primary (public) system has been destroyed, over the years. This is the cause of the crises we have in our secondary and tertiary institutions to day. We need to fix the physical infrastructure, provide the facilities for teaching and learning. Let primary school teachers be the FIRST to take their salaries and allowances monthly. Promote them and expose them to constant training (continuing education).We must ensure that both teachers and students get the necessary books for teaching and learning. Free education? Nothing is free! Someone must pay for it. That is the reality from our experience, Nigerians do not value what does not cost them anything! The cost must be shared with the government with a sense of responsibility by all and at all levels of education.
The establishment of Schools of Basic Studies will not solve the problem permanently. We must go back to the source of the problem - the collapsed Primary and Secondary schools system. Basic Studies are a stop gap measure. In those days when the North went for Basic Studies, it gave them a temporary and immediate solution. Education is still the greatest problem in the North today, because the primary and secondary schools are in a shambles.
One big problem the government must address urgently is the issue of the qualification of our teachers. I have seen many who hold teaching qualifications but cannot speak or write sentence of English correctly! What will such people teach and in what language! Something must be done urgently about teachers who are qualified but not competent to teach in our schools system. How about those who are teaching without having teaching qualifications or those with forged certificates - 0/Level, NCE or degree? If this problem is not solved, all other steps that are advocated here may not help us much.
The “revolution” we envisage for primary schools/system will also have to be extended to secondary and other post primary education schools, if our education is to be restored to enviable levels. Government should encourage teachers through appointing, capable and competent ones into political and professional positions of power and authority at the state level. There are teachers in the state who have distinguished themselves and have rendered selfless services to the state. Can we not find one serving teacher who is capable of being appointed a commissioner? Can the state not institute annual merit awards for teachers in our primary and post primary schools in Kogi State? I understand that teachers’ salaries and allowances are deducted from the source and paid to the Teaching Service Commission (TSC). Why then can teachers not get their salaries when other civil servants get theirs? Our Hon. Commissioner for Education should see to this and do something about it.
Inspection of schools used to be a powerful instrument in those days-1950s and 1960s for establishing quality in our education system, Where is the inspectorate division in today’s education system? Making unscheduled visits by the officials of the Ministry of Education to schools cannot replace the Inspectorate Division. The commissioner should receive monthly reports about the state of education in the state through a structured and stable system. Finally the summary of our suggestions is that the government needs to elevate the teachers in its primary and secondary schools in the state. Secondly, teachers in primary and secondary schools should be the first to be paid their monthly salaries and provide a favourable environment for teaching and learning in our primary and secondary schools. Give recognition and incentives to teachers who distinguish themselves. Annual awards for teacher with financial benefits should be instituted for teachers. Restore the glory of the inspectorate division of the ministry of education.
It is our belief that these measures will revolutionize our education system. What is needed is the political will!
Moses, Adekunle Omoniwa (PhD) is the Librarian of Kogi State University, Anyigba.