Frank Talk: When SS2 pupils can’t spell their names

Many of us think we know the extent of
the rot in Nigeria’s education sector,
but, believe me, what we know is
probably just the tip of the iceberg.
For instance, I never knew it was
possible for a secondary school pupil in
this country not to have an answer to as
simple a question as “when were you
born?’’ But alas, a girl, who was
supposedly in SS2 in Imo State,
declared that she was born in 1905.
Sensing that something was wrong with
the answer from the facial expressions
of everyone around her, she changed
the date to 1945. When   asked to write
her name, she wrote “Ezne” instead of
“Ezinne.”
If you think I made this up or it’s an
exaggeration, other examples of
blunders from some of these
schoolchildren will make you think
otherwise.   A pupil in JSS2 was asked to
write “Lizard” and he wrote “Eliza.”
Another one in SS2 defined a citizen as
“anyone who can go anywhere and do
anyhow.’’ A Christian pupil in JSS2 could
not open the Book of Numbers in the
Bible, while some pupils in JSS1 did not
see anything wrong with saying, “Our
daddy are going to work.’’
The teachers are not left out. A
teacher in a private primary school, I
learnt, sent a note to a parent informing
her that “her daughter have not bring
her note to class.’’ Another teacher in a
secondary school in Badagry, Lagos
State, is fond of telling his pupils: “I see
you here, I see you there, are you
twice?” Another one asks his pupils to
“open the window and let the climate
come in,’’ while a host of others teach in
their dialects.
I have come to the sad conclusion that
no matter what I write, no magic will
scale up the performance of a lot of
Nigerian children in external
examinations in the next 10 years, at
least. More than one million students
failed the 2014 May/June West African
Senior School Certificate Examination.
Out of the 1,705,976 candidates that
sat the exam, 1,176,551 performed
below the minimum requirement for
admission to any Nigerian university.
Only 529,425 candidates (31.28 per
cent) had credit in five subjects
including English and Mathematics.
Ironically, Ghanaian students have
consistently won the prizes for the top
three positions of the examination body
at the international awards for best
candidates in its five-member countries.
If current results are harvests of seeds
sown in the past, as some may argue,
I’m afraid of what awaits us in the
future. Certainly, the seeds we are
sowing now cannot yield any meaningful
fruit, no, not in the nearest future. I
must admit that, for the children of the
elite and the middle class, the picture is
far rosier. The ones I pity are the
children of poor Nigerians. For them, it
is indeed a dim future.
Compare a typical Nigerian child to
someone like Chester Smith, a young
chap I met during my tour of the Space
Centre in Houston, the United States of
America. Now 27, Chester   works at the
space centre. But, he was mentored by
scientists and astronomers at the space
centre right from his secondary school
days. He had many opportunities of
visiting the centre. This fuelled his
imagination and helped him to follow
the path that would make him live his
dream.
I must confess that even as an adult, I
found the space centre mind-boggling.
There are more than 400 space
artefacts, including a moon rock that
one can touch. Seeing mission control
room from where human space missions
and the operations of the International
Space Centre are monitored gave one
this behind-the-scenes look at space
exploration. I even saw one of the
astronauts, live; an experience that our
guide said was uncommon. Seeing the
most powerful rocket ever built and
watching the live mission updates and
the future of human space were simply
amazing. At a time, I felt as if I was
lost in space myself.
Every year, more than 100,000 teachers
and students around the world visit the
space centre. Sadly, these are the
same children that Nigerian kids who
can’t spell their names are expected to
compete with in this ever-growing and
dynamic world. How possible is this?
It is unfortunate that the children of the
poor in this country will always bear the
brunt of our poor education system. And
it doesn’t have to be so. Almost 90 per
cent of Ghana’s children are accessing
quality education at government’s
expense. Some even aver that the
country is spending proportionately
more on education than the United
Kingdom.
The problem with Nigeria goes beyond
poor funding. Sometimes, the little
funds available are not well-utilised. I
once wrote on billions of naira meant for
primary education rotting away at the
Central Bank of Nigeria. The money is
still there. We are not just a serious
country.
The Indian education system is one of
the poorly funded in the world, yet it
manages to maintain a standard that can
compare with China’s, which is known to
be one of the best in the world.
While serious governments are thinking
of how to make their children perform
better, we are playing kites with our
own kids. Even, the United Kingdom
that we look up to as a good destination
for education recently took over 60
mathematics teachers from China to
teach pupils in its centres of
excellence.
In the same vein, China that many
developed countries believe to be the
best in mathematics still encourages its
teachers to be more intelligent in both
the way they teach the subject, and the
work they require of their students. The
teachers are expected to hook on to
locally-organised teachers’ research
group where they can get suggestions
for good lesson plans. That is not all.
The teachers are expected to complete
between 240 and 540 hours of further
training every five years. Anyone that
does not reach a certain level is fired.
No wonder, China has continued its
ascent as a major economic power.
But, here government at all levels keeps
paying lip service to education. Our
minister is only interested in fighting
corruption in the system. He will deal
with corrupt lecturers and teachers.
What does that mean? As for the
governors, they value their political
ambition above the lives of Nigerian
children.
The governors keep deceiving
themselves that they are working. Even
when they understand the problems,
they lack the political will to proffer
solutions. Take for instance the case of
the Comrade governor of Edo State,
Adams Oshiomhole, who publicly
ridiculed a teacher who could not read.
When it was time to choose between
ensuring quality education in the state
and his second term ambition, he gladly
chose the latter.
Other governors have accused their
teachers of not being able to solve
primary three mathematics, yet they
have retained them. They can’t afford
the political backlash that sacking them
would generate. Which country does
that and makes progress?
How can we be keeping teachers who
ask their pupils to “open the window for
climate to come in” in the system in the
21st century? No amount of training
and retraining can redeem such
teachers.
We will keep dreaming of a better
country forever until we address the
problems bedevilling our education
sector. Only quality education can give
us the hope of quality leadership.
Investment in education goes beyond
structures. Government at all levels
should engage smart teachers. There
should be training and retraining
programmes for them, and they should
be forced to engage in self-development
as is being done in serious nations of
the world.