By Maryam Abeeb
The Teachers Registration Council of Nigeria, TRCN, has stated that over 90 percent of the teachers in private schools in the South-west are not qualified and not registerable with the TRCN.
Registrar of TRCN, Prof Josiah Ajiboye, who stated this while signing a memorandum of Understanding, MoU, with a South African-based educational organisation, Instill Education, said that the data was got from a survey conducted by the Council recently.
He lamented that a large number of teachers employed in private schools in Nigeria today are not qualified to be called teachers.
Ajiboye stated that the agreement signed with Instill Education will assist with upskill in-service for Nigerian teachers adding that a pilot phase of implementation of the MoU will soon commence with a capacity building for eight weeks.
He said the MoU has three major components- pre-service teachers, integrating pre-service with in-service teachers and their capacity building programmes, while expressing confidence that the involvement of Instill Education would bridge the gap between pre-service and in-service teachers.
“With regards to our teachers, if you look at what we have said here today, three major components actually were identified: the pre-service teachers, even integrating pre-service with the in-service. We have looked at pre-service teachers, the in-service teachers and their training programmes and we have been able to see that there is a gap,” he said.
Ajiboye stated South-Africa-based organization was coming with their expertise and technology to be able build the capacity of teachers.
“We’ve been talking over time, about mandatory continuing professional development for teachers, where teachers are going to take certain capacity development programmes and they will get points and this will count towards the renewal of their licence as well as their promotion,” he added.
On his part, the Dean of Operation at Instill Education, Mr Tom Parry, said the training received through his organisation will always end with a practical applicable component so that teachers have an opportunity to practice and understand.
Parry said the MoU will focus on upskilling of in-service teachers, adding that in the future, his orgnanisation hopes to bring together the pre and in-service programmes into a micro credential division so that teachers can continuously upskill themselves, gain access to relevant quality, affordable practical training that is recognised by the government, practical in their ze classrooms and help them to deliver better learning outcomes.
