Human Capital Development in Nigeria

OPEN EDUCATION, TEACHER EDUCATION AND THE QUEST FOR SUSTAINABLE HUMAN DEVELOPMENT IN NIGERIA

BY

SAHEED OLANREWAJU JABAAR PhDAND

HAUWA ALIFACULTY OF EDUCATION

NORTHWEST UNIVERSITY, KANO NIGERIA

Outline

• Introduction• Defining Open Education• Teacher Education in Nigeria in the context of

Open Education: A historical overview• The Concept of Teacher Education• Teacher education and sustainable human

development.• Conclusion and recommendations

Introduction

• Formal education alone cannot sustainably provide the man power needs of a nation.

• Knowledge in our contemporary world is constantly changing.

• Knowledge sharing is key for sustainable human capital development of a nation.

• Open education offers becomes very relevant especially in teacher education.

Teachers can be likened to brain in the human body towards actualization of educational goals and national development.Human societies are composed of human capital, natural resources, and social institutions that bind the society together. Of the the three, human capital is the most critical.

Defining open education

The concept of openness suggest the following:• Free access• Removal of impediments and barriers.• Inclusiveness It has the advantages of being:• Interactive• Collaborative• Participatory• Flexible in terms of pace, time and place

Open education in Nigeria National Policy on Education

Open education is meant to:• Provide access to quality education• Meet educational needs of employees• Encourage internalization of tertiary education curricular.• Ameliorating the effect of internal and external brain drain in tertiary institutions.

Open education in Nigeria has taken forms such as:• Correspondence courses• Part time programmes• External degrees• Sandwich courses

Evolution of teacher education in the context of open education in Nigeria

• Teacher education began with the effort of Christian missionaries such as CMS, Presbyterians, Baptists, Wesleyans and the like.

• The focus was production of Grade III and Grade II teachers to teach in all classes in primary schools.

• Following the 1955 and 1957 UPE in the Old Western and Eastern Nigerian respectively, there was need to produce more teachers.

• The Elliot commission of 1943 culminated in the establishment of the University College, Ibadan.

• Ashby report of 1960 culminated in establishment of Colleges of Education.

contn• Distance education in Nigeria dates back to the era of

correspondence education.• The first indigenous distance learning programme started as an

English Radio programme of NBC in 1960.• University of Lagos started its correspondence and Open Studies

Unit in 1974.• The National Teachers’ Institute (NTI) started distance education

institution in 1976• Ahmadu Bello University (ABU) Zaria started its distance education

termed Teacher in Education Programme (TISEP) in 1972.• ABU later introduced University of the Air programme for

secondary school teachers.

contn

• University of Ibadan started its Distance Learning Institute in 1979.

• The first distance learning tertiary institution in Nigeria was the National Open University of Nigeria (NOUN) was established in 1983.

• It was re established and reactivated in 2002.

National Open University, Nigeria (NOUN

The concept of Teacher Education

• A teacher is the one who is specially trained to impart knowledge, skills and other qualities to learners in a formal system (Dada,1999)

contn• Teacher Education is professional education of teachers to attain

knowledge, skills and attitudes considered desirable by the society (Osuji, 2009).

• It is meant to make teacher to be efficient and effective in their work.

• It should be a good blend of knowing what to teach (content) and how to teach it (method)

• For human capital development to be sustainable, teacher education should be continuous.

• In spite of considerable improvement in the entry qualification into the teaching profession, the sector is still faced with myriad of challenges such as:

Challenges facing Teaching Profession

• Poor condition of service

• Poor social status• Issue of professionalization• Inadequate training of pre service teachers• Inadequate in service training for in service

teachers.• Poor supervision of in service teachers

Teachers and sustainable human development

• Sustainability of human capital demands the plan to ensure the quality and quantity of professionals available today are available in future.

• To ensure this, teachers must possess the knowledge, skills, values and competencies we desire to have in the future generations.

contn

• Inadequacy of efficient teachers especially at all levels of education leads to a vicious cycle of mediocrity.

• Teachers’ knowledge of subject matter and their teaching skills need to be continuously upgraded and updated.

• Open education offers a unique opportunity for its capacity to break barriers imposed by time and space.

To break the seeming vicious cycle of mediocrity in the man power development of Nigerian nation, teachers at all levels need to avail themselves of the immense opportunities provided by open education to update their knowledge.

Flexibility and dynamism that characterizes open education make it possible for teachers in tertiary education to update their teaching skills in spite of their tight schedule.

Conclusions

• Teachers are key toward ensuring that the knowledge, skills and competencies required for national development are transmitted to the future generation

• Teachers at all levels in Nigeria can utilize the available open educational resources to develop themselves professional without having to leave their jobs.

Recommendations

• Condition of service of teachers needs to be improved.

• Continuous professional development of teachers at all level should be compelled.

• National Open University should float PGDE with a focus on teaching in higher education.

• Need to reposition open education so that its products can compete favourable with products of conventional universities.

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