Maryam Abeeb
The Teacher Registration Council of Nigeria TRCN has called on stakeholders in the Nigerian Education Sector as well as the Media have been tasked to join forces with the council to end quackery in the teaching Profession.
The Registrar of TRCN, Prof. Josiah Ajiboye made the call in Karu, Nasarawa State, during a one day workshop on the Gains of Certification in Nigeria’s Teaching Profession, organised by the Council for Education Correspondents of Nigeria.
He said that no nation could grow without quality education provided by quality teachers, hence the need to focus on education quality in the country.
According to him, teachers hold the key to development as they produce all other professionals, and quality education is driven by quality teachers.
“In countries like Finland, the qualification for teaching is a Master’s degree and they select their teachers from the secondary school.
“They selected the best of the best. It is a stringent process to get into teaching there. “In our country, we have to be interested in the quality of teachers.
We should not allow politicians to bring unqualified persons into teaching. “This is not right; the country cannot progress in this way and that is why we have started certain programmes in the past few years,” he said.
The registrar commended President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration for ensuring that teaching profession was given a facelift through the approval of welfare packages for teachers.
He said the council had also increased the training of teachers in 24 states across the country from 30,000 to 45,000 teachers to provide 21st century education and ensure professionalism in the sector.
“The minister has approved 45,000 teachers to be trained across 24 states. It was initially 30,000. We have done the first leg of the training of 7,500 teachers.
“We must join forces to rescue this nation from quackery to deliver 21st century education to the country,” he added.
The Chairman, Education Correspondent Association of Nigeria (ECAN), Mr Chuks Ukwuatu, commended the council for promoting excellence in the sector through effective registration and licensing of teachers.
Ukwuatu said that the efforts of TRCN had helped in promoting professionalism and restored sanity in the system.
