Education curriculum in Nigeria institutions should be reviewed ― ARCON boss

The President of Architects Registration Council of Nigeria (ARCON), Architect Oladipo Ajayi, has called on the Federal Government to review the present curriculum in institutions across the country, saying that the curriculum currently narrows the scope of students’ knowledge.

The ARCON boss canvassed this position during an interactive session with newsmen in Lagos to mark his 66th birthday celebration, pointing out that the inability of the government to monitor and ensure full implementation of its policies in the education sector had created an imbalance in the nation’s education system.

Ajayi, while emphasizing that the duty of ARCON is to promote the standard of education in Architecture, raise the standard of practice and to register members and give licences and ensure they have good conduct, lamented that some universities in the country had not been cooperating with the council in its bid to carry out due process and ensure they produce quality graduates.

“We have been to them at the Nigerian University Commission (NUC) and to be fair to them at the NUC, they are trying to marry what we have with what they have to come up with a good policy.

“The curriculum of training in our institutions today are wrong, not only in architecture but in all our institutions. Government has good policies but they don’t follow them up. Before you graduate somebody from secondary school today you should confirm that he learnt carpentry, that is the purpose of 3/3. After that, they will sieve from the number and know people who will go the university and those who be in the technical field.

“But how many of the children today graduate as carpenter or electrician after completing the 3/3  programme? That kind of system is no more, that is why we now have people coming from a neighbouring country as artisans to work in the country.

“We need to go back to that system to train the hand and train the brain. That is what we need in the country, not just the paper certificates that we are carrying about.

“Personally I believe in technicians and para-medicals. People can really make a lot of money and be fulfilled professionally by doing that but the issue there is that nobody wants to be called a paramedical staff, they all want to be called a medical doctor and people will accept, wrong diagnosis and people are dying,” Architect Ajayi said.

Harping on the problem of people attending unaccredited universities, ARCON boss said both the students themselves and their parents were guilty, arguing that they ought to have gone to the affected institutions to do their verification before accepting to admission into such schools.

Speaking further, Ajayi said ARCON’s recent visit to the National Assembly to submit the paper on procurement, whether to raise mobilization fees, among other issues, had started to yield the desired results as the lawmakers had started to consider their position of matters.