Expert cautions against sending underaged students abroad to school

Education expert and the National Vice President of Manufacturers Association of Nigeria (MAN), Eastern Zone, Mrs. Emelia Akpan, has cautioned Nigerian parents who send their under aged children abroad for schooling to cease forthwith.

Akpan lamented that three quarter of students sent abroad for schooling do not realise the need for their foreign trips because they are minors,stressing that instead of improving, they get worse by becoming drug addicts or end up in jail.

Akpan who is the founder of Showers Group of Schools, spoke with journalists yesterday at the Silver news Complex, Trans Amadi Port Harcourt, Rivers State.

She said, “sending any student that is not up to 22 years abroad for schooling is not wise, if send them out early, they grow with depression and when a child grows with depression, they grow with Juvenile. The ideal age to send students out is from 22 years, at this stage, they will understand where they are coming from and would be able to overcome depression from their peers.”

Akpan maintained that, the standard of education offered in overseas could also be got here if government invests properly in the educational sector.

She said,” Education in Nigeria is not valued by the rich because of lack of adequate attention in the sector. People feel only those who didn’t do well in school should go to classes to teach, no”

“Government should set the pace by selecting first class students, send them to teach in public schools and pay them very well like those in oil companies and you will see the changes in the school system within a short while”

Akpan argued that, going to teachers training institute should not be criteria for one to become a teacher, she insisted that teaching requires continual assessment and training.

She said, the country has lost big investments by sending her children overseas to school, regretting that the country is loosing a lot.
The education expert also added that removing religious practice from the school curriculum has increased cultism and other related crimes in the society.

She noted that fundamental religious practice in schools helps to guide students and cautioned against its removal.

Similarly, the Permanent Secretary, Rivers State Ministry of Information, Paulinus Nsirim, charged parents to provide qualitative training to their children to enable them become good ambassadors that can move the nation forward.