Taking colleges of education out of the woods

By Sulaimon Olanrewaju

Pix by Sulaimon Olanrewaju

The importance of the college of education sub-sector to the education system in the country requires no emphasis. The segment it is that provides teachers for the primary education sub-sector. Without the colleges of education, the primary education system in the country will suffer a serious set back.

The Nigeria Certificate in Education (NCE), which product of colleges of education are awarded, is now the minimum qualification for anyone aspiring to teach in a primary school because of the conviction of the government that the Grade II Teachers. Certificate formerly recognised for the primary level of education could no longer meet with the demands of that sub-sector. Thus, NCE, which was the requirement for teaching in the Junior Secondary School (JSS) segment, became the requirement for primary schools.

However, despite the decision of the government to make NCE the minimum teaching requirement in the country, the general belief is that this has not really had any serious positive impact on the educational system as many products of the primary school system, especially those from public schools, lack the required skills. Many of them, after spending six years in primary school, can neither read nor write. Their communication skill is poor and often times, when they get to secondary school, their teachers have to communicate with them in their native languages which make progress difficult.

The intriguing part is that the standard at that level of education was not that bad even when grade II teachers were teaching in primary schools. Reacting to this, Dr. Phillips Tella, former Provost, Tai Solarin College of Education, Ijebu-Ode, said the falling standard in primary education sub-sector was part of the general decline in the standards of education in the country. This, according to him, is due largely to years of neglect of the sector. He argued that since it is more difficult to build than to destroy, correcting the anomaly in the system could not be achieved over night.

Dr. Tella, however, did not absolve the NCE teachers from the blame for the noticeable flaw in the system, although he would prefer a holistic scrutiny of the whole process to get at the roots of the problem. According to him, unlike in the past when students enrolled in the colleges of educations principally because, though qualified, they could not gain admission into the university, most of the students who go to colleges of education these days go there because they have a deficiency.

“So, ‘he said, “there is a wide gap between graduates of colleges of education in the past and the present day graduates.” Tella went ahead to mention some first class university professors who are products of colleges of education. He agreed that there had been a decline in the quality of the products of colleges of education over the years but this, he said, was simply because there had been a decline in the quality of the raw materials (students) that seek admission into colleges of education.

He explained that the expectation of the authorities of colleges of education is that anyone coming to study in a college of education should have some basic skills. But he added that often, even when these students are certified of having the skills, in reality they have great deficiencies in those skills. Since, it is impossible to build something on nothing, the students spend three years in the college and graduate with their deficiencies intact. They get employed as teachers and transfer these deficiencies to their pupils.

“It is a very simple matter,” said Tella. “Quality of input determines the quality of output. It is like what you have in the computer system, when you input garbage into the system, you cannot expect your output to be anything other then garbage.” Tella added that the college of education sub-sector has high flying academics who give out their best to their students as well as the system. “So, the problem is not with the teachers,” he said,” the problem is with the students. Many of them already have a faulty foundation. Don’t forget that the college of education is not a remedial centre, we are supposed to build on what the students brought into the system; we are not supposed to lay a new foundation.

For the sub-sector to get out of the woods, some people have suggested that probably the time spent on teaching practice by students of colleges of education should be scaled down to give them more time to learn the rudiments of the subjects they are to teach. But Tella disagreed with this view. To him, the time spent on teaching practice is time well spent.

“I don’t think the time spent on teaching practice is too much. Students spend three months in their second year and three months in the third year on teaching practice. Altogether they spend six months; I honestly don’t think that is too much.” What the academic would rather want is a total review of the programme. “There is need for constant review of our educational programmes,” he said. “The NCE programme was established to meet a need. We need to keep on going back to check if the stated objectives at inception are still relevant today. I give you an example. Many years ago, university graduates had two courses; one major, the other minor. That has since been dispensed with. Now, most people specialise in just one course. But look at the NCE graduate; he is supposed to major in education as well as two teaching subjects. At the end of the day, he is a jack of three subjects, master of none. I think that ought to change, it does not agree with present day realities.”

Tella then advocated the Israeli model in which aspiring teachers spend four years to learn their teaching subjects and later one year to learn the art of teaching. “This will make them experts in two fields”, he said. “They will be experts in the subjects they are to teach, knowing as much about it as any other graduate. Then they also know the art of teaching.” This will upgrade colleges of education to degree-awarding institutions. He said this will ensure that only those who have the love of teaching at heart venture into teaching. He also suggested that since many of the students admitted to the NCE programme usually have one deficiency or the other, it would be wise to organise remedial courses for them in their areas of weakness as a guard against their transmitting deficiencies to their pupils.

Politics destroys university system - Prof. Yinusa Oyeneye

Professor Olatunji Yinusa Oyeneye

Professor Olatunji Yinusa Oyeneye is a former Vice Chancellor, Olabisi Onabanjo University, Ago Iwoye and the current Pro-Chancellor, Tai Solarin University of Education, Ijebu-Ode as well as the founder/Executive Director, Centre for Policy Issues in Africa . The sociologist who recently turned 60 years, speaks, in this interview with SULAIMON OLANREWAJU, on how to overcome the challenges faced by universities. Excertps:

Congratulations on your 60th birthday. How does it feel being 60?
Thank you very much. The first thing is to give thanks to Almighty Allah for preserving one’s life, particularly in my own case because I went through some difficult periods when I thought I would have gone but I thank God that I am able to attain the age of 60. I am healthy and still in a position to contribute to the development of the society. So, I want to thank the Almighty Allah for that.

Would you like to recall some of your earlier experiences?
There are so many of them. In my education, I have been lucky to pass through what I will call the best schools and the best teachers. I have also been lucky to work in some places that really prepared me for the assignment I did in the last two years. After my NYSC, I worked at the Nigerian Institute of Social and Economic Research in Ibadan. I spent two years there before I traveled abroad to do my post-graduate work. I came back to the institute and spent some three, four years there before I moved to Ogun State University (now Olabisi Onabanjo University), Ago Iwoye as a senior lecturer. Later, I became a professor of that university and also a Vice Chancellor. Most memorable part of my life was the time I was the Vice Chancellor of Ogun State University. One of the things I did was to move that university to its permanent site after 16 years on the temporary site. Apart from that, I got all the courses in the university accredited. I introduced new courses which were accredited by the NUC (National Universities Commission) and professional organizations. I tried as much as possible to put the university on the world map, not only through our academic programmes but by ensuring that our academic staff attend conferences all over the world just to project the image of the university. I tried to improve the infrastructure; we improved the laboratories, we improved the library and also made offices conducive for our academic staff.

Some of my colleagues at the university thought I was high handed but that is not right. As a person, I don’t condone indiscipline. When you try to discipline some of our people, staff and students, they say you are high handed. Over and above that, I want to say that I am a strong advocate of university culture and tradition. Up to this moment, anywhere I may be, I try to protect the university culture and tradition because that was what we were trained to do and as much as possible we just have to protect it. When I was the VC, I tried to woo some philanthropists to the university to assist it. That was based on the premise that I don’t see the government alone funding our tertiary institutions, it is not just possible. I wooed the private sector players and philanthropists and many of them came. I thank God that during my own time there was a lot of physical development.

Maybe the only thing that really pained me was that the then government of the state did not allow me to finish the job I was doing. My plan, with the support of my council under the able leadership of Dr. Sunny Kuku, was to make our university self-sufficient. If I had been allowed to carry out my plan, by now, that university would have no business going to Abeokuta to collect money. We would have been able to put a few things in place that would be generating funds for the university. Unfortunately, the government at that time did not believe in those things.

A lot of people see you as being very energetic as a Vice Chancellor, doing so many things. What was your motivation?
At the time I became Vice Chancellor, I was the youngest VC in this country. Second, I happen to be the only VC that was democratically elected in this country. Since my own election, no VC has gone through the appointment process I went through. Now, coming in as a young man, I could not afford to disappoint the various people who assisted me to get to that position. So, it was important for me to work very hard. At the point I became the VC, the university was in a very bad state, many of the staff were ready to leave the university. I told them that if they supported me to become the VC, I would make the place comfortable for them. When I came in I had no option but to work very hard because the situation was very bad.

I also want you to remember that I joined the university right from inception, first as a part time lecturer and later as a full time staff. So, I was part and parcel of the university. I knew the problems of the university. So, I had to put in all my energy to ensure that the good staff we had at that time did not leave the university. If those people left at that time, it would have been very difficult to replace them. So, I had to sit down, map out strategies and with the support of the staff we were able to turn around the place within a short period. For instance, when I was going in as VC, I said we would move to the permanent site within two years. But in less than six months, I was able to move to the permanent site. Of course, I had the support of the state administrator then, Col. Daniel Akintonde and General Oladipo Diya, who also assisted in making funds available for us to move to the permanent site.

I want to thank God because there is nothing one can achieve without the hand of God. I think God made me the VC at that material time when many of the staff were thinking of leaving. Many of those thinking of leaving then are still in the university today as professors. Some of them have been deans, deputy vice chancellors etc. So, we give thanks to God for making it possible for us to achieve the little that we were able to do there.

You served as a VC, currently you are a Pro-Chancellor. How would you compare the two experiences?
When I was a VC, I had a fantastic Pro-Chancellor. A Pro-Chancellor who did not interfere in the day-to-day running of the university. That is precisely the approach that I have adopted in Tai Solarin University of Education. Once the broad policy is made by the council, the day-to-day implementation is the responsibility of the VC. I don’t believe that any Pro-Chancellor who is worth his salt will poke his nose into the day-to-day running of the university more so if you have a competent VC. But not many Pro-Chancellors will behave the way I am behaving because I am a university person. It is a terrain that I know very well. I want to appeal to the government that we should try not to politicize the appointment of Pro-Chancellors and members of council. We should try to put people who understand the terrain, people who are university people, people who know what the VC goes through, people who can fathom the way the lecturers are thinking, the way the students are thinking. These are the kind of people that should be appointed as chairmen of councils, not just of universities but also of our colleges of education and our polytechnics. When you put somebody who is not knowledgeable about these institutions, they just cannot understand. It may take them about three years in a four-year term to understand the system. But if people who understand the terrain are put in the system, the system will improve.

The issue of politics is very important. People say the greatest problem of our universities is funding, I agree that funding is a problem but the problem of politicization is greater. When we talk of the appointment of pro-chancellors and what have you, that’s one aspect. The other aspect is the appointment of our VCs, the appointment of provosts and deans within the universities, the promotion of professors, the appointment of HODs. Because these things are not properly done, the standards in our universities have gone down. In fact when you listen to some inaugural professors talking, you begin to wonder if they are actually professors. Even some of the PhDs that we award now are not better than the first degree projects that we did in the early 1970s. We must look at all these things if we want to restore the lost glory of our university system.

How do you think universities can be self-sustaining?
There are so many ways universities can be on their own. The unfortunate thing is that academics are not trained to be businessmen. If you talk to an economist, he will tell you about the theories but he cannot run a venture. He is trained to be a teacher, a researcher and somebody who will serve the community. I believe there are ways we can do it. If our universities can start conducting relevant research that will be useful to our industries, some of the research can become patented whereby a lot of money will be coming in. Then, we should get some of the companies to sponsor some of the research in our universities. We still have some good people in our universities who are prepared to do researches that will be useful to the industries. If you go to Europe, that’s where these universities make their money. Apart from that, our universities should start thinking of going into agriculture.

There are also courses that can be introduced which will attract students from all over the world. Universities should also be going into consultancy. There is no reason any of the consultancy jobs of Ogun State government should go to any other organization apart from Olabisi Onabanjo University, Tai Solarin University of Education or any of the tertiary institutions in the state.