EDUCATION AND ACTUALISATION CONVOCATION LECTURE DELIVERED BY HIS EXCELLENCY, DR PETER AYODELE FAYOSE, GOVERNOR OF EKITI STATE, AT THE BENSON IDAHOSA UNIVERSITY, BENIN CITY

EDUCATION AND ACTUALISATION


CONVOCATION LECTURE DELIVERED

BY

HIS EXCELLENCY, DR PETER AYODELE FAYOSE, GOVERNOR OF EKITI STATE, AT THE BENSON IDAHOSA UNIVERSITY, BENIN CITY

ON FRIDAY JULY 7, 2017

Protocol.

INTRODUCTION


I like to start by acknowledging and commending the great vision of Dr Benson Idahosa (of blessed memory) and his wife Mrs Margaret Idahosa for the establishment of this great citadel of learning.

The Benson Idahosa University (BIU), one of the first generation of private Universities in Nigeria, has justified the good intentions of its proprietors having produced high quality graduates in various disciplines who are making valuable contributions to the development of our country and themselves. I also salute the Vice Chancellor, other Principal Officers, the Management, Staff and students of the BIU on this auspicious occasion.


I have chosen to speak with you today on, a vital aspect of our individual and national life upon which the yesterday, today and tomorrow of our country squarely rest.

 I am here to provoke thoughts on education and actualization and thereby simulate further discussions within this academic community and indeed outside of it.

WHAT IS EDUCATION?

Education is not only regarded as an instrument of socialization and reform, but as the generational conveyor or transmitter of knowledge and ideas from one generation to the other and across geographical divides.

The educational systems in different kinds of societies in the world have been, and are, very different in organization and in content.

They are different because the societies providing the education are different, and because education, whether be it formal or informal, has a purpose. That purpose is to transmit from one generation to the next the accumulated wisdom and knowledge of the society, and also to prepare young people for their future membership of the society and their active participation in its maintenance and development. It is meant to transform the mind of man to enable him appreciate the facets of existence and prepare him to take charge of events as they relate to him.

Education is also viewed as a lifting investment quite essential for individual accomplishments and national development.

Thus Okecha (2008) aptly opined:

If you are thinking a year ahead, sow seed.

If you are thinking ten years ahead, plant a tree.

If you are thinking hundred years ahead, educate the people

By sowing seed, you will harvest once.

By planting a tree, you will harvest ten folds.

And by educating the people, you will harvest a hundred fold.

Okecha’s opinion is an appropriate amplification of Confucius:

If your plan is for one year, plant rice

If your plan is for ten years, plant trees

If your plan is for hundred years, educate children

Education is very important such that every authority including past colonialists, native government and authorities, religious bodies, non-governmental organisatrions etc have at one time or the other invested heavily in it.

In our country, year in year out, the aggregate of the investments of all these bodies in education is in the trillion naira threshold.

Currently, the number of Universities in Nigeria for instance stands as follows:

S/N PROPRIETOR       NO

1 Federal Universities 36

2 State Universities         44

3 Private                         68

Total                        148

The number of elementary and secondary schools across Nigeria is in millions. Presently for instance, Ekiti State has 879 public primary schools and 187 public secondary schools. When this is added to the number of such schools across the 36 States and the Federal Capital Territory, the magnitude can easily be conjectured.

In Nigeria, the different levels of governments have adopted education as an instrument, par excellence, for effecting national development. Higher education is one of the items specifically listed in part II of the second schedule of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1999. In effect, both the Federal and State Governments have coordinate jurisdiction on the subject matter.

Further to this, Section 5 of the National Policy on education (revised) 1981 states that Higher Education should aim at:

(a) the acquisition, development and inculcation of the proper value-orientation for the survival of the individual and society;

(b) the development of the intellectual capacities of individuals to understand and appreciate their environments;

(c) the acquisition of both physical and intellectual skills which will enable individuals to develop into useful members of the community;

(d) the acquisition of an objective view of the local and external environments.

JUSTIFICATION

The question to ask is why has the state and spate of our development remained below the acceptable standards despite our burgeoning educational institutions, high expectations and huge financial investments?

It is now time that we look at the justification for a society like ours, to have remained poor despite spending hugely on providing education for its children and young people, and begin to consider what education should be doing for our country and its citizen.

We have never done that because we have never thought about education except in terms of obtaining teachers, engineers, administrators etc.

Individually and collectively, we have in actual fact regarded education as a training for the skills required to earn high salaries in the economic sector and often times earn societal recognition for academic titles..

A fundamental mistake we made was to equate education with schools where formalized trainings are held.

In the real sense of it, the fact that pre-colonial Africa did not have schools – except for short periods of initiation in some tribes – did not mean that African children were not educated.

They learned by doing. In the homes and in the farms, they were taught different skills and the behavior expected of members of the society. They learned the kind of grasses which were suitable for which purposes, the work which were to be done on crops, or animal care etc.

The skills they learnt yielded for them bountiful harvests and plenty.

The different herbs, they concocted produced for them relief and cure for certain ailments and diseases.

In some other cases, African children learnt, albeit informally, skills in blacksmithing, sculpture, arts and other areas of human endeavour.

Let us ponder on the beauty and sculptural elegance of the crafting in bronze of the various effigies of Obas of Benin Kingdom for a meaningful comprehension of what is being stated.

The artist and sculptors might not have attended any University but acquired their skills in native intelligence and training.

EDUCATION AND SELF ACTUALIZATION

It is clear that our education and its direction have not been able to chart for Nigeria and ourselves the desired path to progress, development and prosperity.

Today, we have got so many professors in every field or discipline whereas there has not been proportionate capacity and ability to govern nature and its endowments precisely. Similarly, our educational system has produced numerous Engineers, Technologists and Technicians, yet we rely on the expertise and skills of expatriates each time we need to develop critical national infrastructure like railways, highways and to even rehabilitate runways.

Similarly, each time our public functionaries fall ill, our confidence is much more in health care facilities in London or Saudi Arabia than our own National Hospitals.

As if these are not enough, most elites in Nigeria now prefer to send their children to foreign educational institutions to our Universities and so on and so forth.

In a nutshell our educational system seems not providing or is it that we do not trust it enough to provide for us the much desired resource base for growth and development.

The combination of identified factors and others have led to agitations for the return of schools to their original owners and also the intervention of individuals and other non-government concerns in the proprietorship of schools.

Founders like the Late Archbishop Benson Idahosa, Esama Gabriel Igbinedion, Aare Afe Babalola, to mention but a few, have done very well in their intervention in tertiary education and they deserve our commendation at all times.

WHAT WENT WRONG

The fundamentals of the education provided for us by the colonial government were not designed to prepare young men and women for the service of our country. Instead it was motivated by an attempt to foist the values of the British on us and prepare us for the service of the colonial state.

For instance, it was not sufficient for us to learn, understand and speak the English language, but we must phonetise it the way the Briton speaks his mother language regardless of the incomparable sizes of our tongues and shapes of our noses. We were thus trained to become local clerks, white collar and administrative support staff and also to spread evangelical works.

Up till now, everything we do stresses book knowledge. They underestimate the place of natural intelligence and street wisdom which are equally important and abound in our people some of whom do not have the opportunity or intellectual capacity for University education.

I am not however inferring that any person can be efficient as a result of age, or that educational qualifications are unnecessary. My position is that it is a mistake to over-value book knowledge as it is to under-value it. Our theoretical knowledge must be balanced with exposure which is the practical representation of education. I am of the opinion that the development gap between us and the advanced countries has a correlation with the fact that those countries mostly request for evidence of ability to perform tasks while we concentrate on asking for paper qualifications or certificates.

THE WAY FORWARD

In Ekiti State, what I did during my first tenure in office (2003-2006) was to convoke an Education Summit in 2003 where stakeholders discussed the factors militating against the development of education and commenced practical solutions towards resolving them.

We restructured the school system, encouraged teachers, motivated them through training, recognition and other incentives.

My government rehabilitated physical structures and enhanced conducive environment for teaching and learning. We enforced discipline in schools and made fees affordable.

The result was not distant in coming. Ekiti State which was in rear positions of numbers 34 and 35 among the 35 States of the Federation in Public External Examinations before 2003, came 7th and 8th in WAEC and NECO respectively in 2005.

On my return as Governor in 2004 for a second term, I have pursued the initiatives towards re-positioning education with renewed vigour.

Ekiti State is in top positions in competitive public educational contests in Nigeria. For instance in 2016, Ekiti emerged as the number one (1) state in Nigeria in the National Examination Council (NECO) Public Examination for Secondary Schools.

It is time to make up our mind to re-define education in our country and apply it for national development generally and for the actualization or accomplishment of individual objectives and aspirations in life .

The following aspects of the existing arrangement must be reviewed.

Firstly, the entry age of children into elementary schools must be reviewed

Most of our children now enter primary schools before age 6 i.e when they are mostly infantile and therefore unconscious of the values of their immediate society.

Some barely learning to speak their mother tongues. Most absolutely unaware of the norms, values and basic idiosyncrasies of their cultural backgrounds. The outcome is that they finish primary schools without the backward intuition needed to make them responsible citizens and proceed to secondary schools. 

Parents must flag-off the process of training and education for children through inculcation of family and societal values and acceptable behaviours. Parents must draw attention to the do’s and dont’s of the society. The Holy Bible admonishes parents to train a child in the path that he should follow.

Our secondary schools are simply, preparatory grounds for selection into Universities, Polytechnics, Colleges of Education and other tertiary institutions.

The primary and secondary education do not prepare our young people sufficiently for the realities and needs of our country.

They de-emphasise a person’s ability to learn facts, power of independent reasoning with a view to solving real life problems and character or willingness to serve others.

Secondly and quite related is the scheduling of disciplines, curricular and syllabi in our schools.

In most of our institutions, departments and course contents still exist the way they were handed over to us by the British. Our students are prepared for tailor-made studies designed to pass stereotyped examinations.

Similarly, the examinations our students write are geared to certain international benchmarks which do not take cognizance our local peculiarities and needs. We need to reflect on the type of education we need to provide and thereafter select aspects of our syllabus and curriculum that are capable of delivering such outcomes.

Furthermore, we must take a deep introspection into the quality of education offered by the various educational institutions, and at all levels too

There must be a proportionate increase in the quantity and quality of the education we offer.

Proprietors of educational institutions – Government and Private must emphasise on high caliber, well trained teachers. We must also ensure the provision of conducive environment for teaching and learning through enabling facilities including infrastructure and instructional materials.

It will be difficult to derive learning from overcrowded classrooms or from laboratories where there are none or poor materials for demonstration.

Similarly, our education must be tailored to assuring confidence in their target areas.

By this it is meant that opportunities offered in the different disciplines should be such that would arouse or instill contentment, pride and job satisfaction in practice.

For instance, a medical doctor who had spent such long years in training should practice medicine to the level of admiration and become a role model to up-coming generations. How do you reconcile trained lawyers turning into comedians for instance?

Another one is the poor attitude of our children to learning or studies and the misuse of facilities for Information Communication Technology (ICT). Students must wake up to real learning since acquired knowledge is crucial to self actualization or accomplishment in life. Our children must brace up for serious studies since their future well-being depends on the formal and informal knowledge they acquire from the four walls of formal institution or from the society outside of it.

In this connection, studies must be taken purposefully for acquisition of knowledge which could later be translated or used for national or self accomplishments. 

Examination malpractices and all forms of cheating must be roundly condemned and eschewed by all students. As learners, students must not pretend to be what they are not.

Furthermore, I admonish students to shun all distractive tendencies and attitudes especially the misuse of internet facilities, cultism, and other profanities.

All hands must be on deck to curb the increasing wave of violence, fraud and other criminal activities online and offline. The campuses and indeed the larger society must enjoy abundant peace and desired progress.

Finally, Government at all levels must admit and come to terms with the reality of the situation on our hands. The present educational system cannot deliver for us the liberation we need from ignorance, lack, diseases and poverty. We must re-track urgently and do a reconnaissance in our perception, handling and funding of education at all levels.

It is pertinent to add that deliberate and concerted efforts must be made to recognize, encourage and reward breakthroughs and discoveries through research.

Our country needs to conquer nature through science and technology to assure for us the so much desired actualization in various fields of human endeavour.

 The Universities and Polytechnics have frontal roles to play in this regard.

I enjoin Idahosa University Students to take up the challenge and be pacesetters in the acquisition of knowledge for actualization.

I thank you for your rapt attention and may God bless us all.