This week, education is very much in the air. First, with the celebration of World Teachers’ Day on Wednesday and second, with the ongoing and over seven-month strike of the Academic Staff Union of Universities. Regrettably, World Teachers’ Day has been converted into ceremonies characterised by marches and official rhetoric, promising to upgrade the welfare of teachers but which rarely happens. The ASUU strike, on its own part, has generated far more heat than light, omitting to discuss crucial and fundamental issues while majoring in adversarial tactics and optics in what looks like Federal Government versus ASUU brouhaha.
Unfortunately, however, no influential issue related to the quality of education has hit the airwaves. Government is determined, it appears, to put an end once and for all to all this “nonsense” about ASUU strikes. However that is viewed—and posterity may be the best judge—the nation has a right to refuse the ungainly straitjacket and unproductive confrontation into which important matters concerning our education are being encrusted.
One of these issues—which in my view, explains a lot about the eroding quality of education—is the failure to place a premium on the values and virtues of self-tutoring. Not long ago, I ran into a balding ageing man, probably in his early fifties, who had taken degrees across four or five disciplines, including Master’s Degrees in Law, Sociology, Political Science, among others. Despite the glut of degrees he bragged about, he did not appear to be replete with insights. Politely, however, I kept nodding my head and congratulating him on being so studious and ambitious. As he announced, notwithstanding, that he was set to take yet another degree, this time in Philosophy, I became sufficiently miffed to intrusively ask the question, “Is the quality of a person’s mind equivalent to the number of degrees he has received?” Visibly annoyed, he engaged me in an argument which I managed to sidestep seeing he was on the verge of exploding.
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