Only 3 teachers for all subjects at Tukuba primary school

“There are just five of us, the [headmaster] and assistant [headmaster],” says Stella Oziegbe, who  has taught at the school for two years.The numbers fell to three after two were transferred without replacement.“We are lacking classrooms,” Oziegbe says to a team on a field trip to the school. It is a community outreach organised by […]

“There are just five of us, the [headmaster] and assistant [headmaster],” says Stella Oziegbe, who  has taught at the school for two years.
The numbers fell to three after two were transferred without replacement.
“We are lacking classrooms,” Oziegbe says to a team on a field trip to the school. It is a community outreach organised by the charity, ActionAid Nigeria and Civil Society Action Coalition on Education for All, in this year’s Global Action Week on Education for All.
“There are not enough classrooms for the pupils, no staff room for the teachers, no textbooks, no borehole for water…that is why we cannot stay here.  And the road again is not okay.”
It is a litany of deficiencies that primary five pupil, Bartholomew Danjuma, 12, recited listed ease. He wants to be a teacher when he grows older, but only three teachers handling every class at Tukuba won’t help him.
On his list: classes, water, toilet, road.
Tukuba has four classroom blocks, but only two are in use. The other two have since become death traps for students and teachers after they fell into dilapidation.
Sections of their walls and roofs collapsed; weeds, moss and lichen have taken over sections of the green-and-yellow paint that identifies it as a local education authority building.
Only three teachers with so many pupils “means they are having multigrade classes,” said Ifeoma Charles-Monwuba, deputy country director for ActionAid Nigeria. “It is not easy to improve the learning outcome in those conditions.
“When we know that all over the world, children are sitting in classrooms that have internet facilities, all manner of state-of-the-art conditions, we must call attention to the fact that right here in the FCT, we still have these kinds of conditions.”
The conditions are “very painful and agonising”, says Olu Abiala, national coordinator of Teachers Economic and Welfare Programme.
He said neglect of the school has also deprived the surrounding community of development infrastructure that should have been sited there on account of the school’s presence.
He urged the FCT education department to post adequate number of teachers and make Tukuba environment conducive to retain teachers.
Tukuba is a typical rural community, but it is also smack dab in the centre of the country, where infrastructure standards are considered better than in schools elsewhere.
This comes at a time when the FCT Universal Basic Education authority insists on commitment to make its schools child friendly, fitted with toilets and modern classrooms, according to Adamu Jatau, Director of the FCT Universal Basic Education Board.
FCT has 536 primary schools, 136 junior secondary schools, 200 early child care development centres, and 14,000 staff controlled by the Universal Basic Education Board.
“In FCT there are so many contending issues. While education is demanding money, health is also demanding money,” says Jatau.
He admits that the number of teachers the FCT gets in recruitment falls far shorter than its expectations yet it is nor easy to make them stay in schools like those of Tukuba.
Their absence means more students are crowded into classrooms, and teachers teach more than one level at a time.
Getting youth corps members on service to temporarily handle school classes is one suggestion being considered, but there is concern that without some repairs and basic school facilities, they could go the same as way as the teachers.