 Alright, thanks for staying with us. Now according to UNICEF, one of, one rather in every five of the world's out-of-school children is in Nigeria. Even though primary education is officially free and compulsory, about 10.5 million of the country's children age between five to 14 years and not in school. Only 61% of 6 to 11 year olds regularly attend primary school and only 35.6% of children aged between 36 and 59 months receive early childhood education. In the north of the country the picture is even bleaker with a net attendance rate of 53%. Getting out of school children back into education poses a massive challenge. Now increasing funding to education sector is very important. Now to take Nigeria, or Nigeria's Prosperous and also give it opportunities for job, private sectors to put funds, private sector need to put in funds into development of the child and the educational sector in this country. So what is a currency or what is currently in place and how we can improve the educational system in Nigeria is a question we are asking tonight, right? What can we do? Please let's hear what you have to say. Remember you can join the conversation. Send us an SMS or WhatsApp to 081 8034663. You can also tweet at us at WeishuAfqa or with the hashtag Weishu. Even my education as reading is entering something. But hey, anytime I'm talking about education, I try to control myself because it's something that is a pain point for me. It's a pain point because I see it all the time happen. Even first of all, let's start with our educators. The people that did not pass YEC, they didn't pass JAM, they did like, they made like three YEC results, went to College of Education and you know passed out, they would have started teaching. We have educators who are, they know what they're doing and what they actually need is to upscale and rescale what they already have. So where we have educators in Nigeria, the major problem we have with educators in Nigeria is the fact that when we try to get what we do, we are not, when we do what we do, we are not well paid, we are underpaid, we are stressed out, we are worked up and at the end of the day, we are overworked for it. So I wouldn't say that we do not know our onions, we do know our onions, but our major problem is those we work for. You see, do you want me to attack you or do you want me to... Or in the government sector. So I wouldn't say that all educators, you get your teacher like this. But wait now, wait, let me tell you, the statistics shows, I have tried oil and gas job, it did not work. I tried banking, they did not carry me. I tried sectors, it did not work. What is the next option, teacher? That's the statistics. I don't see a lot of people, even very few people that have seen that set out from the one that I want to be a teacher. And they went to school, they studied English, brilliant results, and they came out and they went straight to teaching. Very few people, most of the educators that we have in this country, they are really, it's like a third, fourth option. If this one will work, this one will work. If that one will not work, that's how it's always been. But hey, I get you, there's underpayment and overworking in the structure. People do not understand and appreciate and recognize the roles of teacher in this country. So that's why they are relegated. I get that part. And it's a fantastic argument because guess what, that is then now the basis why we have very poorly, what's it called, remunerated teachers, turning out poorly educated children. But let me hear your thoughts quickly because I want to bring in our guests. Jennifer? So personally, I think that the education system or educational system in Nigeria needs to be improved on like seriously, drastic change. I think when I was in secondary school, there was something that I noticed in one of our chemistry teacher, the notebook that he was using to teach us was very brown. And based on the feedback that we had gotten from other people, that is the same notebook that he had been using 10 years prior to when we became his student. Very brown notebook. Let me write it down. And to me, at that point, we were all very surprised and shocked because we had sisters and brothers who had gone through the same school. So they'll keep asking you, ah, you remember that chemistry teacher, right? Because they also witnessed the same thing. So one thing we kept asking ourselves was, when did he write this note? And why isn't it changing? And why is the school not doing something about it? Questions I have. For me, I do not school in Nigeria, but it's almost, I would not want to compare per se, but I had siblings that schooled in Nigeria. And I remember then when there was this aptitude test something, I did not do it when I was about entering the university. They did it. So I remember then one of my siblings said his name came out. The next day he said he couldn't find his name. So there's just that image of corruption, even in an educational system, where people can buy results, replace things. And at the end of the day, people come out, not really knowing what they studied in the school because they've paid their way through. Well, let me keep my comments, um, till as we progress in the conversation. I hope it's not the brown book. Compassion for education was born out of her burning love for children and her firm belief in the fact that every child can reach his or her potential with excellent experience in program initiative, staff development, promoting a safe environment and optimizing learning. She holds a remarkable record for exceeding all the faculties go through good external and internal communication and a strong commitment to maintaining a student-centered learning school. And she has joined us live in studio without the brown book. Because now when we sit 25 years away, I just remember the brown book. But I mean, right, thank you first of all for joining us. You look amazing. So I mean, so this conversation, I saw you nodding your head when Jennifer was saying and when Gloria was talking and of course EC quickly, right? When Jennifer was talking, I remember the same thing. I studied physics in the university, right? We were still learning how to deal with analog matter when people had gone digital. First of all, I think, I don't know, what would you place as the foundation of the the educational challenge that we have in Nigeria? Will you place it at the heart of what's it called the manpower as the teachers? Or would you place it at the heart of funding? Or will you place it at the heart of maybe government policies? What is the main disconnect that causes the educational system to continuously nosedive? Thank you very much for having me. When you talk about education, it actually cuts to the core for me. It's not about that. The first thing that you have to consider when you talk about education is what's the curriculum? Who is designing the curriculum? Who is making those policies? And I found out in all my years that unfortunately, when these policies are being made, the people in the sector are the last to be called to contribute to that sector. It's like when I was a younger teacher, we used to say amongst my colleagues that they put together carpenters and bricklayers to come up with curriculum that we're going to deliver to children of the future. How then are they ever going to catch up with their peers? Because what they need is not supplied by the people who know it, and so who put it down? And so that's why we're far behind. We are readers in Nigeria, God we are readers. We struggle, we strive, but we find out that we're still behind. And the reason we are behind is because there is no curriculum. There's no basis for the curriculum. The curriculum does not translate to what is the everyday life. There's a disconnect between what is delivered. That's why the person with the brown book keeps recycling the brown book because he's not he's not looking at the fact that education is in levels. And so when you had a level, what you were taught, you can teach it to the children of these days. That's what the book, the book in school, so he imagines that he would teach the same thing he was taught 25 years ago. So who is responsible for this curriculum? Now the education ministry is supposed to be responsible for this curriculum. Unfortunately, the people who are also in this education ministry are ignorant. And so it just happens that it's not inclusive to find out exactly what these children need. What do they need at this time? Because when I look at the, for example, the ICT curriculum of today is they're talking about mainframe and they're talking about the computer. And I'm wondering, how is that useful? Put that in history. Take that out of ICT and put that in history. That's where they tell you okay, what they used to be a computer. I used to be a computer. I showed them the picture. Yes, just because you want them to know where all this came from, because it's also helpful for them to know what happened. The journey. Yes. And then how did they transition? How better are we from that time? But when you put it in ICT and you expect the children, that's a part of it that they will learn. That's why she said when she got to 100 level, she found out what they taught them in 400 level was what somebody else in another country was learning 100 level. That's the reason it's recycled. It's just recycled. It's not moving. It's not growing. My question was, you have nailed it on the head when you stated that the curriculum of Nigeria, the Nigerian curriculum currently is nothing to write him about, but there is a lot to do with it. If I stand corrected, the last time they actually involved educators in making the curriculum was in 1969. I stand corrected. Now, in this context, where do we now, how do we now move forward from this eclectic curriculum we have, we've had for so long? How do we infuse skills into it to help the students to up their game in class? Okay. Well, it's going to take some doing. It's not going to be as easy. It's really going to take some doing. First of all, the people in the people making the policies have to first of all accept that there is something wrong. When they accept that there is something wrong, we're going to have to keep on talking and enforcing and there's need for training. Unfortunately, when you talk about teachers and the problem of teachers and the problem of educators, it's a function of training. If I don't have something, I can't give it. I can't give it. Somebody must help me to get what I need. These days, thank God, there are more facilitators who are ready to actually go teach people, but also it is important because when you're talking about underpaying, that's another problem. There's still a financial problem. There's still the financial problem because when you say underpaying, somebody will give only 100% attention when the person is satisfied. This person is relatively comfortable. Then the person can go. There are a lot of free online trainings, free, but the person who is not yet comfortable does not think of the free. They're spending their time looking for more money. A teacher's time is extremely precious because the time for preparation is far more than the time to deliver. When you see somebody who is not prepared, it would be very obvious from the outcomes that this person is not prepared and the children will be the worst for it. In order for them for us to be able to do that, the teachers also have to understand that I have a lot to learn. Trying to employ people is a problem. Employee teachers is a big problem also because they don't have continuous education. Today there's a strike, tomorrow there's another strike. How much of the time, when they're supposed to be, the four years they're supposed to train, how much of the time are they in school? Sometimes it's not even their fault because even when they sit with you and you want to have an interview, they can't speak correct English all the way. The ramifications of all this are a lot and it's going to take a lot of people to get together to make sure this happens. Unlike Gloria and Jennifer to come in, I just want to hear your quick thoughts on private institutions because now we had federal schools and all of that in those days and all of a sudden the private schools they saw a gap and they started filling that gap. But I feel like I think that has been what has increased the problem of the educational sector because maybe if we had probably twisted the arms of government to make sure that those schools are because there are some parts in the world that private schools are shutting down because they don't have customers. So what's your take? The private school, emergence of private schools, did it help the educational system or it actually further added problem to it? I think to a very large extent it helped because the vacuum would have been larger, it would have been worse if the private schools did not step in at the time. The only thing that I found out was that that may be pulled back the hand of government because there was now a choice and parents had a choice. I mean if I want for example now with the strikes, the private universities are populated. They are rejected because the thing is even the ones whose names you don't even know, they are actually populated now with this, particularly this last one that was so long, the parents just pulled their children out from the public schools and then put them in the private universities so that if you say I'm going in for four years you should actually go in for four years. It shouldn't be more than four years and my daughter was a victim of this. I mean she went into study law. Instead of a five year course she ended up in seven years. I became disillusioned because I mean at the time she had to keep her hopes up, had to keep pumping, had to keep pumping because at the point she said she didn't want to go to law school anymore, she was fed up, she was tired you know and it was just a tug of war. So I made up my mind when my son was going to get into university that he would go to private. I wasn't going to be able to stand that thing again. He was going to before and he was going to before. So these are the things that the private universities and secondary schools actually came to feel or else it would have been worse off. You can imagine if during that strike if 80 percent of Nigerian children were in public school. What was the quality? Let Gloria come in because we have plenty questions. I also have plenty questions, but I think you've really explained one of it which is the curriculum issue. So my question now is what role do especially when it comes to private schools what role do these school owners have in terms of training the teachers because other organizations I know they have budgets for training of staffs. So what role, okay a teacher comes to your school and you feel like this person has the potential but it's not optimal enough. So what how intentional is it you know training the teachers to make sure that they deliver quality education to their students? You know it's all still about funding. Tom comes down to funding. But private schools have money. They don't. You think they do. They don't. You see the reason why it is a problem is because there is so much to give back as a result of the fact that you pay for it. There's so much you have to give back and so sometimes the training of the teachers take the back seat because they have to fulfill some other things and then the situation of the economy doesn't help. Anybody who is the owner of a school has to have determination, has to have the drive, has to have the exposure to say whatever happens there's going to be a place for training and that's where they are different from themselves. They're not all you know there are those who came into it because they just want money not because they have a passion for education. They just want more. They feel the school business is a money spinning business. The good thing about it, find out it's not true. It's not true. It's not a money spinning business. There's a lot that you have to do. Before any school owner starts to get any profit, it takes up to seven years. Wow. Before you start to get anything, it takes up to seven years. The school has to stand. If you wanted to go through the test of time and I would leave you. Wow. Jennifer. So talking about educators, teachers, lecturers, how can they improve on themselves and how can the institution assist them in doing that? Yeah I've had situations where we had to force it. Where you didn't push, we had to drive you to do it because a lot of things would be tied to that. You wouldn't just be static. You have to keep moving and we will provide you avenues, pathways through which you will go, inexpensive through which you will go and you will get taught and you have to keep the lifelong self-development. You have to keep doing it because there will be things tied to that. That you don't want to stay put because if you stay put for too long and people come and overtake you, you're on your way out. So you do have to put things in place to ensure that people are learning. So bringing it back to curriculum and I know that the government has a hand in that but as schools allow to teach students things that are outside of a curriculum, I mean it doesn't necessarily have to be under that particular subject. Now I know that some schools have activities in which they try to engage the students and some of them are teaching them phonetics, some of them are teaching them French, Italian and all of that but that's not where I'm coming from. I'm talking about important yeah like subjects like different things just to sharpen their mind. I mean those things might not come out in the exam that is fine but are schools allowed to do that? Yes there is an exam you would find out that a lot of schools now do the mixture of exams and so they mix up the Nigerian with the British curriculum or the mix of the Nigerian with the American curriculum, it depends. So they have the mix and so the children have to have a qualifying exam and this qualifying exam is not an exam that is set in Nigeria. It's an exam that is set by the international body but it's just administered here. So a lot of schools are you know take but that is a very expensive project. That's true. I was going to say that you want an international school. It's a very expensive project to get that done but a lot of schools who value the mix are getting it done and they're not giving the parents a choice because I know that where I was school head in fact all the schools have been head in the last 15 years or 17 years we've had that mix and then we don't give the parents a choice to say I don't want it because you know when something has a cost attached to it parents ask you is the optional. No it's not optional. It's not optional because they say no the children don't need it they're going to Nigeria. I say whether they are going to Nigeria or not they need it. It's going to help them. You know the business I mean that is a different whole ball game because this one doesn't have any mix of Nigerian. At all. At all you know but all the other schools where I've been had the mixture of the Nigerian and the British so but this is Canadian completely Canadian. It's not even something that is designed here. The teachers have nothing to do with the setting of questions or the designing of the curriculum. The teachers just deliver the curriculum and they have to be trained to deliver the curriculum. Is that not really tough for you to be able to get teachers because now you're not you're not benchmarking the standard of the teachers with Nigerian standards you are benchmarking it with an international country. Yes it's a very difficult process to get the people who will teach that but even when you get first of all you want to you want to know that they have a British background. You want to know that they have taught in a British school. Well that's a requirement. Yes that's a requirement. Interesting. Then when you when you come in you are then taking through the training you can't get into the class for one day without that training. You have to pass through the training to know exactly how to go about teaching because it's more application-based. We're very used to read boy down. So we don't test our brain to think. Yes it doesn't that's why we are the way we are and that's the truth. As much as we read we're still like this. That's because we just we don't read to know we read to pass an exam. Okay so and immediately the exam is done you forgot it. You have to think. The children have to learn because even the children who come in are coming in from these same schools and they have to be taking through the process of unlearning and relearning. Yes because they cannot they just can't identify with what how are we going to do this. We're not going to they are they are they are they are is foreign to them plagiarism is foreign to them because everybody plagiarizes in Nigeria and this curriculum has zero tolerance for plagiarism. Zero. You can't copy one sentence from anywhere and own it. You will be found out. You must reference it. It must be a very short quote. Your work should not even be a lot of that. It must be a lot of your thoughts because you are asked what do you think? What's your what's your opinion? Yeah so when you have learned this now how does he apply to you? How do we translate? You know I'm asking yes because I see it play out and I see that the children are that are being taught in these kinds of environmental curriculum. They actually are doing a lot better. Yes. So how do we translate that kind of what's it called curriculum and structure? How do we start to relate it because we're trying to find the solution here. We can't continue with this kind of curriculum that we have in Nigeria. It means that if we continue like this we are just going to lead to our final barrier as an education. Yes our education will just completely go down. So what do we need to do you know how do Nigerians need to start to demand because now elections are around the corner. Yes we're trying to elect people. Yes. What should be our demand as regards to the educational system improving it. That is why in the first place all those people who say they are heads in the education sector who don't seem to know what they're doing should be taken out. A more progressive set of people who want a better Nigeria, who actually want the children to be educated should be put in. It doesn't matter when I was I was listening to somebody who was saying that it's not about the certificate it's about what the person delivers. It's not about okay I came with I went to school I go on paper it's translate that paper into real life make it applicable that is what we should be looking for in the leaders that we choose. That was the question I was going to ask you. The question I was going to ask you was based on how do we emphasize on skill education which is vocational education instead of cognitive because everything we do in Nigeria has to do with cognitive skills. So how do we encourage our students or our learners to you know invite and adopt vocational standards more because the people who are the people who are facilitating first need to know that I need to put this in for the children to learn. I remember in one of the schools where I was head and we had aside from the owner was very big on having them learn vocational skills and so without cost he went on to say get experts in this field they don't necessarily have had to go to university just get people who are skillful get them in on a particular day of the week get the children involved in different things somebody who likes photography get the person into photography the people who like masonry get them involved in masonry the people who like cap entry get them involved so the children were moving every term they would move from one skill the next term you are in another skill so by the time you are done after six years we get we got children who were really skillful and were able to go out and actually today they are doing things I have some of them who are big shoemakers wow big time shoemakers you know because entrepreneurs yeah these were things that they learned along with all the other skills and he helped them a whole lot wow that's actually good to know because I've talked at different points in my life during my first internship I was a teacher and I was an ICT teacher so teaching students and sometimes I think there was a cost I was taking they gave me the curriculum I said oh it's robotics I said I don't know anything about it my boss told me you would learn it before you come to class go through it you have google you have because these children a lot of them were very interested in it because it was totally different from what they would study normally in their classrooms so when they come to class be rest assured they are going to get questions because I'll ask you why is this why is this not this way why is this and even during my NYSE I was working in the ministry but then I was also a teacher on the side and it taught me a whole lot I fell in love with teaching because it so it made me I became sort of I had to be very psychological about a lot of things because I had to take out time to understand each of the students and you need to understand their learning power their attentiveness in class so I didn't treat the students the same way so how do we get more people like Jennifer into the teacher we have one minute to go we need to go back to the teacher training colleges and make sure that we we get them out we turn them out from there but it's going to take a whole lot I promise you it's not simple money can truly bring brighter minds into the teaching system yes it can it can no let's take a comment and we'll wrap up the conversation okay okay why I get my comment so this person says good evening my ladies oh it's a long comment sisters of what are you saying improving the educational system in Nigeria I really do not have much to say according to my beautiful sister ec she made mention of the teacher's being poorly paid and I agree with her wholeheartedly and if that happens you cannot get the best out of that teacher trust me the government should also invent invest in education and not abandon it because it is very important they cannot say because their children are not schooling in Nigeria then they will abandon it it does not make sense to me so glad and excited to see my beautiful ladies is my beautiful lady ec happy new year to you I miss you a lot after so many months of absence okay thank you but thank you so much I mean we can't take any more comment we've run out of time but we'd love to have you over and over again because now we'll break it down she'll come and tell you how to ask questions all these people I want to be your leader or if they eventually get this if there's not even focus on the elections who are the ministers let's begin to ask questions let's begin to call them to order because if we leave the educational system as it is we are going to be all be in trouble yeah I don't talk my own thank you so much thank you thank you thank you glory thank you Jennifer now remember before we go follow us on all last year social media handles that waste your Africa you can interact with us further drop a comment and most importantly follow all our engagements on social media like and share and invite your families and friends to watch and follow the conversation now if you missed our quote for today here it is again hi education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world this we cannot overemphasize and it's just the truth we'll see you guys tomorrow wait for me tomorrow