20th September, 2018
An educationist, Mr Yomi Otubela, has advised parents to allow their children to be of age before school enrollment to enable them cope with challenges of primary education.
Otubela, also the National Deputy President of the National Association of Proprietors of Private Schools (NAPPS), gave the advice on Thursday in Lagos.
“Ideally, pupils are supposed to proceed to secondary schools by the age of 12, but here, we see parents enrolling their nine and 10-year-old children in secondary schools.
“At such young age, the pupils might not be sufficiently developed to absorb the challenges of secondary education, except in exceptional cases where there are gifted children.
“Parents should understand that there is no use to rush their children into schools, and government can also formulate policies to control and regulate early child education,” he said.
The educationist, who is also the proprietor of Lagooz Schools, Agege, Lagos, advised the government to create and sustain a workable education policy that could improve the quality of education in Nigeria.
“Education policies should be allowed to outlive particular administrations so that they can be sustainable and result oriented.
“A situation where one regime introduces the 6-3-3-4 system; the next changes it to 9-6-4 and the system is about to be changed again could be problematic and will not guarantee quality,” he said.
He educationist urged the government to create “minimum standard schools” and to ensure that government schools did not fall below such standard.
“It is advisable for federal and state governments to set up minimum standard schools and ensure that both private and public schools adhere to such standards.
“Primary school teachers, for instance, should possess a minimum of the National Certificate on Education (NCE), while secondary school teachers should possess a degree in education to qualify them for employment.
“This will go a long way to ensure recruitment of qualified manpower in schools, and also enhance the quality of the Nigerian education,” he said.
He urged the government to support private school owners by allowing them to benefit from single-digit credit facilities from the Bank of Industry.
He also advised the Lagos State Government to eliminate “multiple taxations” for private schools and create a “one-stop shop” in the Ministry of Education, where all education-related taxes could be settled.