A university lecturer, Dr. Dimis Mai-Lafia, has lamented the prevalence of negative influences in our secular education and the dwindling enrolment of children in schools.
The university don explained that despite all efforts by the government to encourage the enrolment of children in schools through the Universal Basic Education (UBE) programme, records show that enrolment figures have been on the decline, because parents are forced to engage their children in menial jobs to make ends meet.
Delivering a lecture at the 9th graduation of West Nigeria Christian College (WNCC) Abeokuta in Ogun State, Dr. Mai-Lafia, who is the Dean, School of Business and Human Resources Management of National Open University of Nigeria (NOUN), stated that the situation is worrisome.
He noted that, “all over the country, from Maiduguri to Sokoto, Ilorin to Makurdi and Lagos to Calabar, many children of school age are either out of school completely or hardly attend classes.”
Referring to the report of the United Nations Children Education Fund (UNICEF), he said an estimated 10 million children who should be in school are out of school and that this figure consists of 6.2 million girls and 3.8 million boys.
Saying that the situation at the tertiary level is a reflection of what obtains at the primary and secondary levels, Dr. Mai-Lafia also blamed persistent strike, lack of stability and accommodations for students at the university level as the reasons for the degeneration in the education sector.
He observed that “the situation in the tertiary institutions is similar to that in the nation’s primary schools and secondary schools.
"For instance, many primary school pupils do not know the difference between six and half a dozen. The book that a 1971 primary one pupil could read is Greek to many 2007 primary six pupil.
"In the same vein, the task that a university graduate in 1980 would perform without any stress when he was first employed is a herculean task to a fresh 2006 university graduate. Moral decadence has taken over our schools, with girls exposing the sensitive parts of their bodies in the name of civilization, while lecturers demand sex for marks.”
Dr. Mai-Lafia stressed that the reform, which the education sector required, could not just be solved by throwing money around, which according to him, contradicts the Biblical injunction in Proverbs 17:16, which states: “Of what use is money in the hand of a fool, since he has no desire to get wisdom?"
He, therefore, asserted that the true education is a spiritual process and nurturing of the soul.
“Education is the nurture of a spirit that is rational and moral, in which conscience is the regulative and imperative faculty,” Dr. Mai-Lafia noted, adding that, "the purpose of conscience in this world is to upkeep moral.”
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