There is no gainsaying the fact that the Nigeria education is decaying at an alarming rate. The decay is more evident in the public school systems run by both the federal and state governments.
I have been through the public school system just as I have garnered years of experience in the private sector dedication system. Regarding the recent challenges in the public school system, I have heard colleagues that have gone there tell me that what they met there wasn’t what they had been led to believe while they were still outside the public system. One thing they have come to say is that there is serious corruption, which is stunting growth. They said that there is a very corrupt mechanism in the public school system. These colleagues said the older ones in the public school system are the ones that conduct “orientation session” for new entrants into the system, by telling them “this is how we do it here.” What that clearly means is that everyone is there to make their own cut. So, to solve the problems, there is need to separate the role of the Ministry of Education into some sort of system that would allow actual meeting and public learning.
The decay in the education system is also driven by moral decadence on the society. We have politicians all around us, either as relations or friends. And we see their corrupt lifestyle, which stares us in the face. Their conduct and attitude in boldly rigging elections to get into office reinforces in the mind of the coming generation that the end justifies the means. That is why students in universities engage in sorting out their lecturers with money and other ways.
So, the moral decadence is driven by the love of money and affluence. The inordinate pursuit of money is also contributing to the peculiar out-of-school syndrome in some southern parts of Nigeria. You find teenagers who do not want to go further in education. They ask you why they should waste time in school when they can do Yahoo Yahoo and make money. But the truth is that people go to school to gain education and then earn a degree.
Solving the problems in education sector will help stem the decay and protect society values. We must work together to achieve this goal.
• Ayoola Adeyinka, an expert educator and Director, Strategy and Growth, Western College, writes from Lagos.