Mrs Folawe Omikunle, Chief Executive Officer, Teach For Nigeria, a non-profit organisation on Thursday said the Nigerian education sector needed to attract the best and outstanding people into the classrooms.
Omikunle told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in an interview in Lagos that the government needed to address and change the recruitment process to attract only outstanding people into the system.
She said many people went into the teaching profession because of the need to survive and not for the passion and the love to teach.
She said that there was a lack of motivation and interest in some people going into the profession.
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“There is a need to look at how we are recruiting the teachers in the first place.
“We need to see if we are recruiting and providing the right training for them to be successful in the classroom.
“I think the starting point is how we are recruiting teachers.
“Who are we recruiting? What is the crop of people we are recruiting? What is the component? What is the makeup of the individual that we are recruiting as our teachers?
“In the developed countries, a lot of people refer to like countries like Finland, Singapore and other nations that are performing and outperforming their education.
“They attract the very best and brightest as teachers.
“In many countries, the best and brightest are the ones who are going into education, because they want to have a good standard and train students who in turn will transform their economy,” she said.
Omikunle said teaching was a second choice or third choice to some people, while others use it as a detour before getting a better opportunity.
She said there was a need to make the teaching profession a place of pride where only the best and outstanding people are recruited.
“We have people who went into teaching because that was the only course they were offered during admission.
She said that Nigeria, banks, oil and gas and consulting firms were the ones attracting the best minds.
“Everybody wants to work in a bank, hospital, oil and gas but nobody wants to work as a teacher.
“I have done my research in some colleges of education and I discovered that just one per cent of students in the faculty of education chose to be a teacher.
“I think we are in a state of emergency and what needs to be communicated is the urgency to transform our nation through education.”
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