‘Technologically inclined teachers would replace deficient ones’

Registrar and Chief Executive, Teachers Registration Council of Nigeria, (TRCN), Prof. Josiah Olusegun Ajiboye, has charged teachers to burnish their careers by taking advantage of opportunities presented by technology.

According to him, doing so would make them competitive, and capable of treading tackles equally with their counterparts from across the world, without being intimidated.

Speaking at the second induction ceremony organised for Bachelor of Education (B.Ed) graduands of University of Abuja, held recently, Ajiboye noted that it is important for teachers who want to get to the peak of their profession to be technologically developed, just as he allayed fears that technology would replace teachers.

“Technology would not replace teachers, but teachers who are technologically inclined would replace teachers who are technologically deficient”, he said.

He stressed that Nigerian teachers must be able to access information on the Internet through their mobile telephones, and in order to catch up with ongoing technological advancement. This, he said, remains one of the ways of getting exceptional teachers who are world-class professionals.

Ajiboye commended the Federal Government for keeping faith with the Nigerian teachers through its unalloyed support for the ongoing professionalisation of teaching.

To the inductees he said, “Induction is one of the critical elements that adorn a profession and makes it clear that teaching is no longer an all-comer affairs. In Nigeria today, it is not only an absurdity, but an offence for any individual to teach, without being registered by TRCN.”

He new education graduates across the country to key into the induction protocol, which he described as international best practice and benchmark.“All inductees are accepted into the teaching profession without the rigors of undergoing all the cycles of Professional Qualifying Examination (PQE). Any teacher education graduate, who fails to make good use of this grace period, would write the full circle of PQE, in addition to other rigours before their registration as professional teachers is validated.”

He further stressed that TRCN, under his watch, would be selfless in its drive towards expanding access to teacher education, while also informing that the council has developed programmes of study such as Professional Diploma in Education (PDE), and Post-Doctoral Diploma in Education (PDDE). The PDE and the PDDE are in addition to the Post Graduate Diploma in Education (PGDE), which TRCN has also developed a National Benchmark for.

“TRCN has also developed the Teacher Professional Development Assessment Framework (TDPAF), (awaiting public presentation). The document would help the individual teacher in self-assessment, and also put their employers in a vantage position to determine the suitability and capability of their teachers per time.

He, therefore, called on teachers who do not have education qualification to avail themselves of the opportunity provided by these programs.Vice Chancellor of the University of Abuja, Professor Michael U. Adikwu, in his remark, described happenings in the teaching profession across the country as pathetic and unacceptable.

“The situation is so bad such that we can no longer boast of our teachers today. The lifespan of knowledge these days is about two to three years, and this is not good for our education system,” he said.He urged all stakeholders to take needed actions to restore the Nigerian education system to its rightful place.