Borno to engage more teachers through voluntary teaching initiative

Borno State Governor, Kashim Shettima, has initiated a Volunteer Teaching Programme (VTP) for political office holders and workers to teach in primary and secondary schools of their choice.

While implementing the VTP, participating workers would have work-free days on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays, adding this would help in rebuilding the education sector that has been destroyed by Boko Haram terrorists.

Shettima announced the new teaching programme while swearing-in 17 special advisers and chairmen of transition committees on reconstruction works and resettlement of Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) to liberated communities at Government House, Maiduguri.

He said the enrolled volunteer teachers would be trained by the National Teachers’ Institute (NTI) before they will given the work-free-days at government offices to teach in schools.

“This will prevent the abuse of long weekends with measures to ensure that workers don’t get work free days without teaching in schools,” he said.

Shettima also directed that special consideration be given to graduates with backgrounds in education in the state government planned recruitment of hundreds of civil servants.

He added that the United Nations International Children’s Education Fund (UNICEF) was already engaged in the training of existing teachers as part of efforts to salvage education in the Northeast.

According to him, Boko Haram had destroyed over 5,000 classrooms and school buildings in 512 primary schools, 38 secondary schools and two tertiary institutions in the 27 local councils of the state.