Education and It’s Challenges : A Critical Survey of our School first vacation
First Vacation
1.0 Introduction :
It was a sunny afternoon when I began my journey to ‘selagi’ my place of work .
As I walked through the village, I noticed how nature was flourishing; the tall trees, the surrounding mountains with very beautiful views;
the grasses, and the little agricultural work seem to have picked up so well and growing fast. No one needed to tell me that the land was very fertile.
Arriving in this village , I looked like the only civilized person, they gazed at me with great suspicion as though , I had come with a different motive .
I called a little boy who was less than 10years of age and tried to engage him in conversation in English, he ran back to his house telling his mum and the community members that the Man that came to their village was speaking a strange language. The mum sort to know which man was that , and as she came towards the carved pastoral area, without a church building or a good residential house , she found me standing with other kids, having conversations in the local language and smiling with the lads. The boy pointed to me and said to mum , that she should ask me to repeat what I earlier said , the mum cautioned him with a little slap on his head saying “ this is Rev . Father “ but this was our conversation, I had asked him what his name was and how old he was; but he was hearing English spoken for the first time and so with the other children whom I had been having conversation with. None of them could understand even the smallest of spoken English .
I knew immediately I needed to begin a school to fight the illiteracy in the community.
Man plans most of his activities in view of some set goals. Man often decides to do certain things because he wants to achieve specific goals. This was my mindset towards the plight of this local community. This work therefore, seeks to highlight the importance of education in the society; giving particular preference to the challenges in ‘Selagi’ educational project.
2.0 The Importance of Education to a Community
Education is a vital investment for human and economic development and is influenced by the environment and within which it exists. Changes in technology, labour market patterns and general global environment, all requires policy responses. Tradition, culture and faith all reflect upon the education system and at the same time are affected by them. The element of continuity and change remains perpetual and it is up to the society to determine its pace and direction.
Without mincing words, we are living in an inquiring and innovative-oriented society. The demands of the 21st century is novelty, creativity, and integration of knowledge at global level, research, critical and analytical thoughts. Rapidly, social changes are creating uncertainty and complexity in the society. To prepare the children and youth to cope with the present situation needs to develop analytical and critical thinking, skill and attitude that would make them more flexible and innovative to deal with uncertainty and crises at national and global level.
It’s excruciating when policy makers in some continents [Africa], give priority over trivial things rather than the educational sector. Education is the bedrock of every society that cherished it. If the process of preparing a set of decisions on education in such a manner that the goals and objectives of education will be realized in the future, with reasonable use of available resources; then, the issue of leaving one’s country of birth for educational pursuits will be fixed.
On a sad note, there are a lot of display of power while allocating educational resources, such as personnel, fund, physical facilities and even intakes. It is tougher while sitting educational institutions. Ideally, the technocrats in the ministry of education should use appropriate guidelines to take decision on allocation of resources and location of educational institutions. But the political class and pressure groups will prevail on the technocrats to favor certain section of the society. It is now a common occurrence in Nigeria, for the Chief Executive of a state to site an educational institution in his home town. These, and many more ugly scenarios; automatically weakens the educational sector of a nation rendering its importance in a jeopardize state.
3.0 The Challenges in ‘Selagi’ Educational Sector
The school you saw in my introductory post is the school we built to help this poor and vulnerable community. The school is not near completion in terms of any major standard , very few chairs, few tables, infact simply put, this school does not posses the conducive atmosphere to be called a school. But we are eternally grateful that we have started the formation of the minds of the lads .
It’s painful that most of them have to learn under hard and uncomfortable conditions; but my joy remains that, their minds are being formed and they seem to be picking up fast.
One of our major challenge, is the underfunding of this school. From the level we all saw from my introductory post, we were able to achieve to some extent through our agricultural products, few financial support from members outside the community, through my weekly spiritual adoration and family assistance. In view of my set out goals for this community, which is to raise this school to the utmost standard to enhance learning.
Today, we can be proud of ourselves because, we have tried to solve the problem of students trekking miles away from their various homes to attend classes. The official pick up van given to me by the diocese has become means of converging these students early from their respective homes to the school. This has not solved the problem entirely, as we seek assistance from men and women of goodwill to get at least two buses to ease the burden on these little children risking their lives on a rocky and patchy areas.
We lack in the area of poor teachers quality. Some teachers in the school today are highly incompetent, they lack content knowledge as well as pedagogical skills as a result of them been resident of the community. Getting qualified teachers in the urban area which is proximately about 30kilometers from the community posse a great challenge. In regards to this, I had brought up the idea of inviting professional resource personnels to train our teachers at the end of every month. It will amaze you that, this method has paid off tremendously as the pupils are assimilating well to the system. It is also my responsibility to from time to time check-mate the teachers through their lessons note to make sure the right curriculum is been followed; so the students won’t be led astray. This is also to bring to our notice that, four of our teachers where sent to further their studies in the Teachers Continuous Institute in Cross River State; Nigeria , through my little savings. The idea is simple: “Never think of what the society can do for you; but what you can contribute to the society”. By the time I’m gone or transferred to another pastoral unit; this community will never lack in these areas mentioned.
In the area of shortage of manpower, we have tried to increase the burden on few numbers of teachers on ground. A school of over three hundred students, been tutored by only twenty teachers. Wow, this sounds crazy!!! Due to these inadequacies, one teacher takes over four lessons per day, even at times, when I’m less busy with my pastoral work, I hit the classes to teach them as well; since I’m doing an encompassing pastoral work. We cannot shy, but to open up, to seek assistance to avert this pressing concern so our teachers don’t suffer of born-out later in their lives. Though, for the meantime, since the students are on vocation at the moment, I’m reaching out to folks in the urban areas if they can sacrifice their time just for a semester before we look towards fixing the anomaly before us.
Poor parenting and guidance, it is normally upheld that, proper upbringing of the child plays an instrumental role in his learning process. Bad parenting makes a child more prone to criminal behaviors. Neglected children and those who are exposed to abuse are more likely to be prosecuted for juvenile delinquency. Other common effects of bad parenting include failure to thrive and poor growth and development both physically and mentally. This is the fate of this community, this is the cross I have chosen to carry on my shoulders. I’m privileged to experience all these in this community, I’m even more energized to see that I put them on the right track by giving about thirty vulnerable students whom their parents can’t afford the little token as school fees a free scholarship and writing materials been given them at the beginning of each semester. This initiative will continue even when I’m gone since it’s been endorsed by the school management. These are done to take the children’s mind off crime and other domestic violence. Therefore, parenting entails caring, protection, guidance, provision of basic needs for the child up keep in order for him or her to be properly equipped to meet with the challenges of life, in accordance with the laws of the land.
Despite these challenges, we are still keeping hopes alive, and contributing for a proper integrative humanism of those students . I’m happy, now you can have a conversation with these pupils and students in english language; and their writing skills too improves rapidly.
4.0 Way forward and Conclusion
Education is both the act of teaching or imparting knowledge to others as well as the act of receiving knowledge from someone else. An untrained mind is a disaster to himself, the students and the community at large.
One would be right to say that, education is the bedrock for societal transformation and for the sustenance of any meaningful development. Education is the sustaining base of the world political and social economy progress. It is hoped that in the near future, education will bring greater technological and scientific transformation to the nation. One will wonder, in a sophisticated and changing environment like ours, some in the hinders don’t have the opportunity to catch up with civilization. These students are digital natives, some have not seen or have an idea how the computer looks like, only in pictorial evidence found in their text books . Our plan is also to go digital, as we look forward to getting desktop computers and laptops from our benefactors.
Finally, I owe myself duty to the church and the community; to see that these people under my watch experiences that light at the end of their dark age episode. I’m only human, I acknowledged my shortcomings, I cannot strive here all by myself, that I ask for the grace daily not to backslide in these acts of giving back to the society; and I solemnly ask for your moral support and assistance. Together, we shall bring those smiles back on the faces of these vulnerable children.