EDUCATION: PANGS OF AN ILLITERATE GIANT!

   Education as we all know is one of the key to national development and which is not a hidden fact  that we have a problem with it in Nigeria. We are about to take a quick look at our educational sector in Nigeria today.

   Nigeria is the most populous black nation with almost 170 million people, 30 million of which are students. Christian missionaries introduced the western education system in Nigeria in the mid-nineteenth century. This education system was more readily accepted in the south. Education is a shared responsibility of the Nigerian federal, state, and local governments. The formal education system in Nigeria is the 9-3- 4 system which was changed about 24 years later by the then minister for education, Dr. Obi Ezekwesili to 6-5-4 , which was then changed to 6-3-3-4 system of education in the year 1982 which we are now using till date. Nigeria has a large number of out-of-school children and young adults with limited literacy and numeracy skills who have little hope of ever joining the formal workforce.  Education indicators are poor nationwide, and the greatest need for assistance is in the predominantly north. 

  
    In Nigeria today, the rate of illiteracy is very very high, according to UNESCO’s 2016 statistical report which was revealed by UNESCO’s National Programme Advisor on Education, Dr Muhammed Alkali , 65 million Nigerians remain illiterate , isn’t that awkward?, the illiteracy rate is just standing above 50 percent , and we call ourselves GIANT OF AFRICA ?, what are we bragging on ? , how are we expecting to end illiteracy while nothing less than 10 million Nigerian children currently out of school and with over 35 million Nigerian adults illiterate, who are we expecting to encourage the children to go to school, children of illiterate parents are most likely to be illiterate themselves, the government needs to get parents aware of the need to get their ward to school. Whereas our sister country South Africa only recorded that just 4.7 million adults are illiterate, with 4.9 million adults functional illiterate i.e they left school before grade 7. I suppose this is a matter of national urgency for illiteracy has adverse impact on both an individual and the society at large. 

   It's certainly not a hidden fact as how our educational sector is bad, from the primary sectors to the secondary sectors , pure infrastructure, unavailability of sufficient teaching equipments , from books to furnitures, over crowding in class rooms and so on,  unavailability or insufficiency of quality teachers and many more in our public schools, there is no way these won't affect the pupils, no wonder quite a huge number of students fails their O'level exams time to time which make most of them end up not furthering their education.
  
Should we fold our hands and allow our valued education system to go in comatose?  Can we really become the Intellectual Giant of Africa?

Together we can!