The National Commission for Colleges of Education (NCCE) on Wednesday, tackled governments at both federal and state levels over some of their policies it considered not favourable to teacher education, saying they were eroding the quality of education in the country.
The commission particularly took a swipe at the conversion of some colleges of education in the country to universities by the federal and state governments, saying such action was killing the teaching profession.
This was as it expressed concern over what it called “attrition or dwindling enrolment into Nigeria Certificate in Education, NCE programmes in the country.
Executive Secretary of National Commission for Colleges of Education, NCCE, Prof. Paulinus Okwelle, who spoke at the opening ceremony of the National Summit on the Future of Nigeria Certificate in Nigeria, expressed over what he described as “recent developments in the college of education sub-sector.”
Okwelle, who said:”On my assumption of office almost a year ago, I was taken aback to discover the multifarious challenges facing NCE awarding Institutions in the country”, also listed high admission requirements; duration taken by NCE graduate to obtain university degree; and issues with National Teachers’ Programmes as some of the challenges the commission was facing in its bid to enthrone sound education system in Nigeria.
Other challenges, he mentioned, at the event held with the theme:” Nigeria Certificate in Education: The Way Forward”, were employability of NCE graduates; the issue of illegal NCE-awarding institutions, and appointment of unqualified principal officers.
“Another challenge to the existence of NCE Programme is spate at which Colleges of Education are being converted to Universities without recourse to the provisions of the National Policy on Education which stipulates NCE as the minimum teaching qualification in the country.
“A few States recently converted their Colleges of Education to Universities of Education without informing NCCE as a supervisory body on how to graduate those students enrolled into NCE programmes before the conversion. At the Federal level, there have been Bills being passed at the National Assembly for a few Federal Colleges of Education to be converted into Universities. This development needs to be revisited to avoid NCE from going into extinction thereby creating negative consequences for the whole Education Sector.
“Parameters and criteria for conversion of any tertiary institutions in Nigeria need to be well spelt out and commonly agreed upon by relevant stakeholders.
“As practice in other climes, the law establishing Colleges of Education could be amended to allow mature ones to operate on a dual-mode; offering NCE programme and a degree in specific courses they have the capacities to run. This issue is worth considering at this crucial moment,” he said.
Noting that, “Recently, few Proprietors of Colleges of Education have been found violating the criteria for the appointment of Principal Officers, especially in State and private colleges of Education”, Okwelle said:” There are established cases of noneducationists being appointed as Provosts of State and Private Colleges of Education.”
” This does not augur well for the image of those institutions and the country as a whole. This summit is hereby requested to come up with a framework that will promote the appointment of only qualified Educationists to head the colleges so as to provide needed leadership in all NCE awarding Institutions (Federal, state, and Private). He said.
Okwelle, who noted that the “foundation of our educational ladder is laid on the quality of teaching and learning at the basic education level”, said,” The first nine years of learning from Primary one to Junior Secondary School three is very sacrosanct and must be given the deserved attention. It will, therefore, be catastrophic should anything go wrong at this level of education.”
Noting also that,”No nation can rise above the level of its teachers”, he said:” Therefore, serious efforts must be placed on teacher education especially at the basic level to be at par with global best practices.”
The NCCE boss, while also noting that, “The National Policy on Education (NPE) put the responsibility of teaching at the basic education level on the NCE graduates being produced by colleges of education”, said:” This is no doubt a very important role that is toyed with.
