Students of the Hafsat Ahmadu Bello Memorial Secondary School in Sokoto State, for long, have had to endure learning in the most uncomfortable manner, sitting on the floor to receive lessons. ANKELI EMMANUEL reports
The recent poor academic performance in Nigeria is only but a manifestation of the level of the falling standard of education in the country which is generally on the decline.
These poor unacceptable performance is even more prominent in the public schools. And this is because Nigeria’s education system has not adequately keep pace with its rapidly growing school-age population.
According to a survey in 2010, there are about 126 public Junior Secondary Schools and 63 Senior Secondary Schools spread across the 23 local government areas of Sokoto state. It was gathered that, of the number of secondary schools, there were 6 Girls Boarding secondary schools, out of the total, 22 boarding schools. Also, there are 10 special science, commercial, technical and vocational secondary schools in the state.
While dissecting the level of enrolment, the survey revealed that at Junior Secondary level was only but 75,070. Of these number, 53,569 consist of male and 21,501 female. Enrolment at Senior Secondary level remained at 46,971, with 34,628 male and 12,343 female.
According to reports, Sokoto has a teaching force of 2,135 at the Junior Secondary level with 1,463 males and 672 females. The teaching force of 1,316 at Senior Secondary level with 976 male and 340 female. There are 1889 qualified teachers at JSS level with 605 being male and 1109 qualified teachers at SSS level with 287 being female.
For long, students of Hafsat Ahmadu Bello Memorial Secondary School, Sokoto, have had to endure learning in the most uncomfortable way. Located in the heart of Sokoto, the state capital, the school is strictly a female institution. You may call it teacher’s inhumanity to students and you won’t be wrong. The sight was both pathetic and annoying. The students sit on the floor while receiving their lessons.
Probably worried about the ugly trend, the state governor, Aminu Waziri Tambuwal on recently declared a state of emergency on the state’s education sector. No sooner had he declared and constituted a committee to help analyse the situation and to advise the state government on possible way-forward. Among those recommendations were a holistic assessment of the available schools across the state to help in determining basic needs of the schools and how best to address same.
To this note, the technical committee formed a subcommittee and trained Schools Specific Needs and Assessment Survey officials. The subcommittee chaired by Dr. Shadi Sabeh, consist of 75 Enumerators and Supervisors that were trained as field officers for pilot survey on Need Assessment of selected schools across the state.
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However, in the school, only a few classes in it have enough seats to accommodate the students. For long, they have to put up with taking lessons while seated on bare floor. Most of them use prayer mats to protect their whote tops from the floor’s dust, while others come to classes with extra wrappers to spray on floor as they sit.
While they have to put up with the most uncomfortable situation to take lessons daily, a few blocks away, 200 sets of classroom furniture were locked in a room, unattended to, and were left to rot.But the suffering of the students came to end when the committee set up by Governor Aminu Waziri Tambuwal to implement the state of emergency declared in education visited the school.
The subcommittee on a visit to one of the schools within the metropolis, Hafsat Ahmadu Bello Model Arabic Secondary School, were shocked to have discovered that, students do not just sit on the floor to learn but that classroom furniture were locked-up in the same school.
That students of the school seats on the floor to learn is no longer news. What however, remained untold was if the scenario is restricted to only Hafsatu Ahmadu Bello Model Arabic Secondary School or a deliberate action to punish the students.
When LEADERSHIP visited the school, situated at Ilorin street, Sokoto South,the principal, Mrs. Hafsatu Maikano declined comment on the matter.She insisted that a written permission be brought from the Ministry of Basic And Secondary Education.
But while in the premises of the school, it was discovered that, despite it’s serenity with aesthetically arranged neem trees and with a befitting fence, students of the school still sit on the floor to learn.
A walk round the school confirmed that in a senior secondary one class, students numbering about 27, at the time of the visit, were all seated on the floor while in another class which obviously had few students, were seated on their mats as teaching was ongoing.
An insider within the school premises who spoke on condition of anonymity disclosed that some furniture that served as seats were locked for about two years.
Strangely, the Sokoto School Basic Needs Assessment Subcommittee, during an official visit to Hafsat secondary school, found that a few blocks away, 200 sets of classroom furniture were locked in a room, unattended to, and were left to rot.
Narrating his committees intervention while in Hafsat Memorial Secondary School, Dr. Shadi Sabeh, who led members of the School Needs Assessment sub-committee during the visit, divulged that they instantly ordered usage of such locked up seats in classes where students seats on floor.
“Upon visiting the Hafsat Ahmadu Bello Memorial Secondary School, Sokoto, students were seen taking lectures while sitting on the floor.To our amazement, a few blocks away, 200 new classroom furniture were locked away unattended to.
“We immediately ordered that the furniture be arranged in the classes in need, and the school management was admonished to always prioritise the need of the students at all times,
“So while the government has provided facilities, the school management cannot decide not to utilize them. The school managers must key into the new vision for better schools or all our efforts will be in vain,” he stated.
