The Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) has been tasked on making admissions into colleges and faculties of education stricter to ensure the best brains enter the teaching profession.
Prof. Segun Ajiboye, Registrar, Teachers Registration Council of Nigeria (TRCN), made the call in Ibadan on Thursday, while presenting the 488th inaugural lecture of the University of Ibadan (UI).
The lecture was titled: ‘Teaching: In the Classroom as a Regulator’.
Ajiboye said that lowering cut-off marks for education courses would have a negative impact on the quality of students who would eventually be teachers in the classrooms.
According to Ajiboye, a professor of Social Studies, Civic and Environmental Studies at UI, cut-off marks to education-related courses should rank among the highest.
“Admission into colleges of education and faculties of education in Nigeria should be stricter.
“The current practice is dangerous for the future of our education. Those who want to teach our children should be the best in our society and not the dregs.
“The hydra-headed crises of quality and quantity of teachers demand a strong policy response.
“Rebuilding the system should take into account how the once cherished vocation, the mother of all professions, should attract the best brains and retain them,” he said.
The TRCN boss noted that the COVID-19 pandemic had challenged the country’s education system.
He said that it was important that teacher education programmes be reviewed to meet modern-day challenges of globalisation and the post-COVID era.
“We must urgently do a review of our teacher education policy and programmes to produce teachers for the 21st century classroom.
“The rest of the world is not waiting for Nigeria. Professional training is critical, just as mastery of subject matter, teachers’ welfare and an environment that promotes learning.
“It is, therefore, important to stress the fact that the need for a review of our teacher education programme is long overdue.
“To meet the challenges of globalisation, efforts should be put in place for an immediate review of the curricular, methodology, motivation and resource components of our programme.
“Teaching, today, demands a lot more sophistication than previously. Therefore, pre-service teachers need to be adequately equipped to meet the classroom demands.
“It is, therefore, incumbent upon governments through their respective ministries to ensure that quality education is provided to our youth.
“For quality education to be achieved, there must be adequate quality teachers, who have gone through quality training; hence, the need to rebrand and re-profile the teacher.
“For this to be realised, there is the need to regulate the teaching profession with a view to ensuring the provision of quality teachers for quality teaching and learning,” Ajiboye said.
