Dearth of quality teachers, bane of education, Afe Babalola warns

Seeks proper funding for teacher training colleges

The Founder of Afe Babalola University, Ado-Ekiti (ABUAD), Chief Afe Babalola (SAN), has warned that the dearth of quality teachers in the country posed a great danger to functional education.

Babalola, who cited the anomalies noticed in Kaduna, Kwara and Sokoto states where teachers failed examinations meant for their pupils, said that the most essential factor for the achievement of functional education, aside from modern facilities, is modern teaching methods.

The legal icon stated this during the 2022 ABUAD Staff Capacity Development Programme, held in the institution yesterday, with a special focus on ‘Modern Teaching Method and Pedagogy’.

He said: “I hope the government of the day across the states and the federal level will continue by not only funding the existing teacher training colleges but also create new ones to meet the dearth of quality teachers.”

Babalola also advised the university management and governing councils to place a high premium on the application of modern teaching skills through capacity building for teachers for the nation to attain a deserved quality and functional education.

He lamented that the quality of teachers in pre-independence Nigeria was far more rewarding than what is obtainable in the country currently.

The legal luminary, therefore, urged stakeholders to design policies that would compel the application of deserved teaching methodologies in schools to improve the quality of graduates being churned out at every stratum of education.

In his keynote address at the event, former Executive Secretary, National Universities Commission (NUC), Prof. Peter Okebukola, said that the qualities of teachers had a great effect on the attainment of quality and functional education.

Okebukola, who spoke on the topic “ABUAD: Leading all the Way,” praised the university for working in tandem with NUC’s recommendations, saying that the institution is already aligning with the minimum curriculum standard that will be released by the Federal Government soon.

He urged the ABUAD’s lecturers to always be circumspect of the major concepts of “how we learn, teaching and learning strategies and practical applications” to make the university largely a result-oriented institution.

The Vice-Chancellor, Prof. Smaranda Olarinde, on his own, said the lecturers as teachers of the future leaders must be professional and practical-oriented to make graduates relevant under the current economic system.