Governor Babagana Zulum of Borno state has raised alarm over the low number of student gaining admission into higher institutions in the state.
Gov Zulum is shocked by the number of Borno students who struggle to gain admission into Universities, due to their poor academic performance, the Borno state governor, held a meeting with 84 secondary school principals in the state, over the weekend.
In a statement entitled, ‘Public schools: Tell me the truth, Zulum said most of the secondary school graduates produced in the state do not qualify for admission into university.
The governor listed the numerous challenges bedeviling the education sector while lamenting the decline in the standard of education.
The meeting was held at the government house in Maiduguri yesterday.
Zulum said those who eventually get admitted into universities still struggle academically.
“Education is the bedrock of any development. Without functional educational system, we shall continue to experience this Boko Haram insurgency in Borno,” Zulum said.
“Look at the kind of students we are graduating from our public secondary schools, most of them do not qualify for admission into universities, even those who get admitted find it very difficult to cope.
He noted that there has been a general decline in the education standard of the public institutions all over the country.
He added that most of the available teachers are not qualified, and listed inadequate teaching facilities, poor maintenance culture, general decay of infrastructure, Government’s inability to ensure monitoring and evaluation, centralised control by the ministry, unnecessary bureaucracy, and irregular training and retraining of teachers and other essential staff as what were bedevilling the sector.
The governor further decried the poor data management and indiscipline as major problems affecting the sector.
“There is poor data management and indiscipline amongst the major problems affecting the public school system.”
The governor also directed “the immediate reintroduction of the common entrance examination” for primary six pupils, insisting that “only pupils who pass the examination by securing a cut-off mark, should be eligible for admission into the first year of Junior Secondary Schools”.
