Policy Development and Nigerian Education

By Amiel M. Fagbulu

The evolution of policy in education has been very important in determining the direction and the rate of its spread in Nigeria. As one moves from one area or era to another, weak policy or lack of policy has created unforeseen problems that have had long-lasting consequences that color how much and what type of education was deemed suitable for a milieu.

A lack of understanding of the role of policy has been responsible for many failed interventions in education. This book traces the evolution of policy and attempts to show the correlation between clearly articulated policies and the suitability of the output of the system to respond to the needs of the society.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse UK
• Release date: Aug 10, 2017
• ISBN: 9781524632601

Amiel M. Fagbulu

Amiel Fagbulu was born in Nigeria in 1926 at Owo, where he attended the government primary school. From there, he went to King’s College, Lagos, and the Higher College in Yaba, Lagos, where he did his A levels. He won a scholarship to the University College in Ibadan where he studied mathematics. He did his professional studies at the London University and Harvard Graduate School, where he obtained his EdD in educational planning. He was appointed an education officer in 1952 and taught in many educational institution including the Edo College in Benin City where he was principal for two years. He joined the inspectorate service and rose to head that outfit as chief inspector of education in the western state of Nigeria. He taught at the University of Benin, where he taught educational planning and rose to be an associate professor. He has consulted widely for UNESCO, UNICEF, the World Bank, Ford Foundation, USAID, and the federal and state governments and their agencies over three decades. He is a founding member and fellow of the Nigerian Academy of Education.

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Published by AuthorHouse  08/09/2017

ISBN: 978-1-5246-3259-5 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-5246-3260-1 (e)

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CONTENTS

Dedication

Chapter 1  Pre-Independence Evolution Of Policies In Nigerian Education

Chapter 2  Policies Through Self Government To Independence

Chapter 3  From The Curriculum Conference To The National Policy On Education

Chapter 4  The National Policy On Education: Yesterday And Today

Chapter 5  The Comprehensive School

Chapter 6  The Failed School System

Chapter 7  The Dearth Of Educational Data

Chapter 8  Pieces Of The Puzzle

Chapter 9  Fixing The Broken Vessel

DEDICATION

To my Sister, Adeteju Asomuyide (May 31,1934 - May 25, 2017)

A former teacher who will now not share these thoughts with me.

Chapter 1

PRE-INDEPENDENCE EVOLUTION OF POLICIES IN NIGERIAN EDUCATION

Introduction

The perennial problems surrounding the delivery of education in Nigeria are the subject of debates and writings, both intelligent and pedestrian. They just will not go away as long as no clear and consistent formulations developed and understood by the people exist. The eggheads and political opportunists that populate the corridors of power where decisions on education are taken, unfortunately parade intimidating credentials that make it possible for them to bully and silence progressive voices while the masses swallow the compounded and half-baked pills of policies that are veiled in dazzling coats of progressivism while they are the very quintessence of regression. Their very presence at the helms of educational affairs is testimony enough to the bad times into which the education system has fallen.

Being products of a very rotten school system, quite a number of those who have a big say in the direction in which Nigerian education is steered today actually mean well but are constrained by their antecedents and dazzled by their positions not to be humble enough to seek and use the services of those who are genuinely able and available to assist in charting a more relevant path to the future. Those who are qualified are few but available from every part of Nigeria. In addition, the Nigerian curse which is the lure of riches, also makes it impossible sometimes for them to put the interest of the country above those of their families, god-fathers, and hangers-on who expect and in fact put pressure on them to ‘perform’ by channeling funds to them as befits their positions.

Aside the moral issue, the recycling of mediocrity in schools and universities started to rear its head in the 1960s when vice-chancellorship became a juicy office to which only those favored by the semi-educated military thugs that ruled the country could aspire, and at a period in which national examinations lost their chastity and could be passed by those who were ‘smart and know what to do’. The outputs of those years have come of age and have passed on the unenviable torch to more than two generations. The decline in social values has aided the exponential slide of education, and the quality of governance that one sees in Nigeria today is a perfect match with the low quality of the output of the school systems and the Sodom-and-Gomorrah levels of societal mores. It is an exercise in futility therefore to expect those who have nothing, to give something.

The corner-stone of any educational venture is the policy which is a clear outline of the planned direction and collective expectations of society. It is a multidimensional tool that has direction as well as a clock, in addition to its having prescriptions that lead to well-defined and measurable goals. That fundamental step incidentally had been taken by the declining generation of the 60s that produced the National Policy of Education in the early 70s. That policy when newly minted had a lot of merits, but like all man-made things, it has been despoiled by the unforgiving hands of Time. Tremendous progress in all spheres of human endeavor has greatly altered the premises on which the concepts in that policy were formulated and deemed suitable for Nigeria. It is unfortunate though that the degraded preparations of those who came after and tried to carry out those course-corrections as and when due have not enabled them to make patches that are at par and in harmony with the original concepts. The harvest of the incompetence of the school system over the year’s compounds and confounds the solutions being proffered. Policy is however the least of the problems that confront education today.

No matter what philosophy of education one embraces, a policy must be the starting point of any search for deliverance from the perennial and cyclical problems that dodge the education system of a people. That search in the case of Nigeria leads back to an examination of the history of discontent in African education. It will reveal the thoughts and failings of those who brought education to Africa and the many genuine efforts made over more than a period of 150 years to wrestle with the answer to the conundrum: Which education is best for a given people in Africa?

The History of Discontent with Educational Policies in West Africa¹

Nigeria has recorded history, and evidence abounds as to what schooling looked like in the two 25-year time intervals from 1850 to 2000 and some. The policies that guided the era of colonies and the period since independence are extant and indeed make interesting and contrasting reading. The problems of education since independence had been there from the colonial period. They only became more pronounced and complex as colonies took their destinies into their hands. Inexperience, anxiety to make a mark in the world, greed which led to corruption, poor governance, and in many cases, social and political instability in communities have all made their contributions to the poor quality and seemingly irredeemable situation of education in Nigeria today.

In the development of education in the colonies, ad hoc Commissions had played a major role in heralding changes of policy. This was a natural carry-over from Britain where the requirements of parliamentary government made it mandatory for government to table and debate issues before decisions were taken. In ruling an empire, parliamentary overview dictated that major decisions be referred to it as was the case for many issues that dealt with the British people themselves.

Apart from the above, a characteristic attitude of the British was their aversion to rigid planning. This was evident in the way education developed both in the colonies and in Britain until recent times. When changes were thought desirable, commissions were appointed to examine the state of education and to make recommendations. The recommendations of some commissions provided inspiration and guidance in education for some years, and when they proved inadequate, others were commissioned to reevaluate the system and set the ship on-course again. That same technique was also adopted in developing education in the colonies.

In evaluating the reports of successive commissions, therefore, one is dealing with the products of peculiar circumstances. By their very nature, commissions, as used by the British were temporary expedience with no deep-rooted links with the past or even the future. All the commissions did was to point at societal failures (which they were set up to correct) and to make recommendations that would inevitably prove inadequate sometime in the future when the march of time changes everything and the process is restarted all over again. Thus it was that in the twenty-one-year period from 1818 to 1839, the following Acts and Reports of Commissions which relate to the education and employment conditions of children (especially of the poor) among others were issued in Britain:

These and many other quasi educational activities evoked the setting up of parallel commissions in West Africa on education.

The first significant and direct commission on West Africa was appointed in 1837. The recommendations of that committee had two noteworthy points:

1. That religious instruction and education be provided in the colonies.

2. That the cost of education be borne by each colony.

The Bills and Commission Reports of 1820, 1834, and 1835 in Britain had made similar points, emphasizing the need for education for the masses and the obligation for each community to finance such development.

The major commissions that moved education forward in the colonies before independence include:

The reports of these commissions dominated educational thinking of their times, and gave rise to regular ordinances and educational codes that reflected the outcome of commission findings and guided what was done in education in the colonies. Together, ordinances and education codes became the main sources for policy formulation over a period of about 120 years to the time of independence.

The Select Committee of 1842

The commission whose report was published in 1842 was not specifically concerned with education. The statutory designation was: The Select Committee appointed to inquire into the State of the British possessions on the West Coast of Africa, more especially with reference to their present relations with the neighboring Native Tribes². In its over a hundred paragraphs on the Gold Coast, only one touched on education, and that only in passing. All in all, however, the facts laid bare during this inquiry and the theories propounded have remained central in the educational development of the British West African colonies.

In conformity with the pattern of concern of the time, humanitarianism was the vogue and its most rewarding areas were those of the slave trade overseas and care of the children of the poor at home. It is not surprising, therefore, to find that the bulk of the 1842 report deals with the issues of government and the abolition of the slave trade. However, experience had shown that freeing slaves was more problematic than their enslavement. Enslavement was brutal and definite in its patterns of callousness; freedom, as was usual then, launched a man into an uncertain future of hardship. To give meaning to freedom, the socially uprooted freed slaves could not be left to their own resources with little instruction and few means.³

There then was the merging point of the dual roles of the humanitarians; they freed slaves who then posed familiar problems of the poor and destitute. The experience gained in Britain in civilizing the poor through education and religion was turned to for the answers. The slaves and others with whom the settlers and missionaries came in contact thus became mere extensions of the problems being tackled in Britain by their energetic humanitarian cousins.

It will be wrong, however, to credit the injection of considerations of educational issues into the 1842 report exclusively to the humanitarians. The first grant for education in Britain had been approved in 1833⁴ and bodies like the Home and Colonial Infant School Society (1836) and the Committee of Council for Education (1839) had been actively at work raising issues of public education for the masses.⁵ In addition, Roebuck had initiated a debate when he moved a motion for the appointment of a committee to inquire into the means of establishing a system of national education.⁶ This had increased the antagonism between the Church and non-conformists ⁷ and it is not unreasonable to speculate that this divisive trend was enough to ensure a prominent place for education in the West African reports, since rival interests were enthusiastically at work on the coast seeking to increase their areas of influence.

The West Africa committee recommended the appointment of a colonial chaplain to augment the efforts of the Wesleyans who were already active in education on the Gold Coast. They also stressed the need for the development of education of a higher quality than was then available to which the neighboring chiefs could send their sons to receive an education which might fit them to be of benefit to their own people directly, if they returned to their families, or indirectly, if they remained, by entering into connections with British interest.⁸

The dual world of the African child was acknowledged here. His education, which was to fit him for this dual role was never clearly defined. One thing, however, was clear, that his education could alienate him from his people.

The emphasis on educating the sons of chiefs must not be glossed over. It had its strategic value as will be pointed out later. The outlook of both missionaries and officials were, to say the least, paternalistic. They were genuinely concerned in their own ways for the welfare of the generality of the people, but many could not help, at least unconsciously, holding themselves up as models for the natives to copy. It was thus the local ruler’s dream to mold his son in the image of the ‘pater’. Many of those sons who entered into connections with British interests eventually flourished in trade and business.⁹

A central theme in the evidence of those who had worked in West Africa was that agricultural instruction was not given to any extent in the Church Missionary schools.¹⁰ Colonel Campbell elaborated a proposed system of agricultural instruction which would cost little but achieve much.¹¹ He based his proposals on the outcome of experiments he had tried out, in which each man was given four acres of land to cultivate during six months of intensive training. They were then relocated and a new batch recruited for training. One fundamental element in this training scheme was that these men were conscious of their employed status during the period of training. Those who showed diligence were rewarded with extra produce, poultry or pigs.

Reverend Beecham proposed a form of agricultural education and Mr. Whitfield actually proposed the establishment of farm settlements with diversified crops in units of about 500 acres planted with cotton, coffee and Theobroma—the chocolate plant.¹² The cotton would provide income to maintain the settlers and defray initial annual expenses; after four years the other crops would provide steady and substantial income. These were, however, aimed at the older freed slaves.

Some impressions of the schools of the time were given in the evidence of Reverend Schoen and others. There was no doubt that education was influencing the natives positively for the better, although the standard was very poor and there was need for ampler means and a better system in order that schools might be made more efficient and influential.¹³ Hamilton confirmed the wretchedness of the schools. He said:¹⁴

The Government schools to which those liberated African children are sent are not worthy of the name of schools; in many cases there are not even books by which they can be taught, and the native teachers are incapable of instructing a child to any extent.

The establishment of schools depended mainly on the exertions of voluntary societies with just a few government schools thrown in. Fees were about 1/2d per week, and the areas of study were reading, writing, and cyphering; grammar and geography were taught to the older classes.

It is clear that this commission was vague as to what it wanted for education. Not much was mentioned about the content of the curriculum apart from the emphasis which was generally placed on agricultural education. In asking questions, the commissioners limited themselves to those areas they considered fruitful and these were usually based on the experience in Britain (where the commission carried out its work). The evidence of Reverend Schoen, for instance, that science was not taught at Fourah Bay College did not evoke any comments or action.

It was clear also that the educational theorists and some practitioners were far in advance of the administrative units of government in their thinking. The reforms proposed by experienced men like Colonel Campbell were frustrated by the incompetence of the administrative officers who were ignorant of the African character¹⁵. Although government assumed nominal leadership, its nominees lacked the experience and motivation of the humanitarians who experimented with the natives and lived close to them and their problems. This divergence in preparation was enough to ensure that no definite policies were formulated to guide the development of education. Those who had knowledge had no powers to make far-reaching changes. They tried to change things but were handicapped by the extreme shortage of funds.

One Mr. Weeks had conducted a successful school where the boys were taught to cultivate cotton, etc.: they also learnt various trades. The girls were instructed in needle and household work by Mrs. Weeks¹⁶. Campbell and Weeks had done successfully in West Africa what Davis had done in Britain¹⁷. Apparently, they were in advance of their times. They gave meaning to the lives of the children who strayed under their umbrella, but were not influential or well-provided for long enough to alter the course of history. Some of the questions to which they provided confident answers then are still being asked today, a hundred and seventy years after.

Eight Years of Uncertain Policies

Just as the stream of commissions on education in Britain flowed unabated, so did those on the general progress of the West African colonies. As was the case in 1842, none of the commissions on West Africa were specifically concerned with education. Education derived its significance partly from its contribution to helping provide a richer life for the freed slaves and partly because of its tendencies to simplify administrative problems. As such, it was an instrument of change, but a secondary one, that education was viewed during most of the succeeding 80 years.

A clearer understanding of the happenings in these years of transition will, however, follow from a quick resume of important development in Britain during the same period.

In the first half of the 19th century, the works of Pestalozzi had inspired people like Dr. Charles Mayo and J. S. Reynolds of Manchester¹⁸, who along with others like David Stow and John Woud, had influenced considerably the development of elementary education in Britain. Emphasis was on methodology and teacher preparation, which culminated in the introduction of the pupil-teacher system in 1846¹⁹.

The second half of the century was, however, concerned with different though related issues. The creation of the Education Department in 1856, the Newcastle Commission (Elementary Education) in 1861, the Clarendon Commission (Public Schools) in 1864; the Argyll (1867) and Taunton (1868) commissions and in particular the Royal Commission on Technical Education (1884) were all concerned with new problems aimed at quantitative, qualitative, administrative and sectorial improvements in education²⁰. Development was marked by the Acts of 1870, 1873, 1876, 1880 and 1902. All these Acts dealt with elementary education²¹.

The next significant commission in West Africa after that of 1842 was that whose report was published in 1865²². Before then, two significant departures had been attempted. Annual grants of £30,000 had been approved between 1835 and 1845 for education in West Africa²³.

The second was an unusual intervention by Lord Grey in seeking to get Privy Council approval to introduce a different type of education to West Africa in 1846²⁴. There was no new thinking here; all that was being done was to attempt to water down the experiment in Britain, that is, adapt them to the needs of the Africans as he saw them and to act on the recommendations of people like Campbell and Weeks. The concept was to establish day schools of industry and model farm schools. The curriculum was to be different and was intended to include household economy, gardening, land surveying, agricultural chemistry, etc.

That this scheme as conceived was too ambitious for the resources of the colonies and that its influence was limited are points besides the issue; what is of significance here is that the general direction of ideas and the center of initiative were changing. For the first time, an idea in line with general thinking was being conceived at the top to be diffused through the system. What was usual until then was the repetitive narration of the various patterns of practice to commissions whose reports failed at formulating regulatory rules to guide future practice. This spark of interest at the center of power, however, only led to limited involvement and did not last. The question of mapping future directions had to be taken over again by the various missions and later commissions of inquiries whose recommendations influenced to some extent, the thinking of the officials responsible for the administration of the colonies.

A committee in 1865 went through the same old routine all over again and nothing clear in the way of a policy was evolved or recommended. The need for a review of the content and quality of education was always recognized, discussed, and met with the appointment of commissions.

One group with a clear-cut program approaching a policy during this bleak epoch was the Basle Mission. They defined their objectives in no uncertain terms. Agricultural education coupled with industrial training was given top priority. The vernacular was taught vigorously in spite of difficulties like conflicting usages, lack of suitable materials, etc. in particular, the crafts were taught and developed. The whole emphasis was geared to teaching not only skills, but the value of time and the dignity of labor²⁵.

If anything, the report of 1865 helped to emphasize how far apart the various groups had gone in their efforts at providing schools for the Africans. In spite of the annual grant from the government, education was whatever each group was willing and capable of giving and it was still possible to say in 1867 that the Colonial Office was wholly in the dark about schools in West Africa²⁶.

If no policy guidelines were provided at this time, however, the need was felt and the appointment of an inspector for Sierra Leone was indicative of this urge to give meaning and direction to the many efforts being made in educating the African. By 1882 the first outline of a definite direction was emerging in the appointment of Inspector Sunter and the unification of the whole of West Africa into an educational administrative unit²⁷.

While focus was on elementary education generally in West Africa, limited efforts were being made to expand facilities at the higher levels. What contributed most to policy at this level was the philosophy which was championed by Dr. Edward Blyden, himself a pure African Negro born in the West Indies.²⁸ His views were ahead of his time and were generally unacceptable to the missionaries who unfortunately tried to capitalize on questionable issues of morals to relegate him to the background.

In his article, Christian Missions in Africa, published in Frasers Magazine, October 1876,²⁹ he concluded that the attitude of the best missionary could not but remain paternalistic. He wrote³⁰:

The full effect of the new status of the Negro race will not be sufficiently felt during the present generation to enable even his best friends to get rid entirely of the pity or contempt for him which they have inherited, and which is, to a great extent, to be accounted for by the fact that the civilized world has hitherto come in contact, for the most part, only with more degraded tribes of the African continent.

As early as 1862, the African product of the white missionary school had shown sufficiently that they were contemptuous of their illiterate brothers and were aspiring to be like their white teachers. Said one chief³¹:

The black man says he is a white man, calls himself a Christian, and dresses himself in clothes; it is an insult to the white man. I respect the white man but these people are impostors, and no better than my people.

The constant debate of the missionaries and others as to whether the African was educable still raged on unabated and reflected their deep-rooted prejudices and acceptance (maybe subconscious) of the inferiority of the African. Blyden gave innumerable examples of this attitude in his article and was convincing enough in condemning the missionaries and their attitudes.

In his inaugural address as President of Liberia College in January 5, 1881, he outlined his philosophy of Liberal education for Africans³². To him education should be generative in the sense that it generates the intellectual and moral state in the community which will give it not only a congenial atmosphere in which to thrive, but food and nutriment for its enlargement and growth.³³

He suggested modifications in the curriculum to suit the peculiar circumstances of the people. Being a product of the classical school he accepted that base, but he also favored Mathematics and an understanding of the African’s rich heritage and culture. He concerned himself with the education of his fellow Africans and did not see fit to plead for the hand-and-eye type education which was the pet horse of innovating missionaries. He had belief in the capabilities of his kind and felt the best was good for them. He wanted adaptation – study of Arabic literature and African culture side by side with English literature, but not a degraded type of education for the generality of Africans. He wanted the attitudes of the Africans altered and he himself was living example of his dream. In spite of his high position at various times, he identified with the African problem and never regarded himself as belonging to the exclusive world of the white missionaries or officials.

In the meantime, the first discernible policy, not by positive proclamation, but from careful observation, was the acceptance of and the emphasis on technical education. Soon after 1895, a rash of technical institutes broke out across West Africa, each incidence being heavily supported by government. In 1896 the C.M.S. opened a school at Freetown; in 1898 it was the government at Accra; and in 1899, the Government Technical School, Lagos was opened. These were strong indications of official attitudes undergoing change in a direction in agreement with those of the majority of influential missions.

The turn of the century opened the flood gates for expansion. The impetus in Britain gave encouragement to Governor Rodger of the Gold Coast who reorganized the whole school system in 1903, and in 1907 set up a committee to consider the compulsory introduction of manual instruction into schools. He eventually incorporated his hand and eye philosophy into the education rules of 1909.³⁴ Rowden, an assistant to Rodger, spread his doctrine to Southern Nigeria in 1909 as the Director of Education. Sierra Leone adopted the same rules later, after Rowden’s inquiry into the educational system of the colony.³⁵

Another significant policy was the renewed establishment of schools for the sons of nominees of chiefs in the protectorate.³⁶ The education was to be secular, scientific and practical, covering areas of farming, carpentry, bridge-building, road-making, surveying, etc. This was in 1905. By 1909 the same policy had crossed over to Northern Nigeria.

The creation of the inspectorate and the establishment of Directorates of Education placed full-time workers in continuous interaction with the people and the problems. Annual reports and governmental dispatches helped diffuse ideas fairly evenly from Freetown to Lagos. The artificial slave community of Freetown of 1840 had been displaced from the center of attention by the natives of the colonies and protectorates whose numbers and dispersal dwarfed all things else. The evolution of administrative rules and the crystallization of patterns of government had forced policy guidelines on education whose development could not now be at cross purposes with those of the other arms of government. The administrative policy of indirect rule by Lugard was translated into an educational policy which provided for Muslim educational needs without uprooting much of their traditions.³⁷ The scrupulous observance of the tenet of religious freedom (for that age and place) in the government schools, and the comprehensive education code for the various colonies testified to a new maturity and vision which were soon to be shattered in the flames of a barbaric world war that was soon to wipe out gains and raise new problems for educational development in West Africa.

Active and fruitful though this era was for West African education, it was a period of experimentation. Individual men like Lugard, Blyden, and others had ideas which they pressed, using their offices or friends to further their dreams. Often those dreams were not original, but were applications of home-bred practices from Britain. The most obvious instance was the carry-over of the recommendations of the Technical Education Commission of 1884 to West Africa in the 1890’s. By and large, official attitude was still only roused from its state of inertia by missionary initiatives (supported by civil servants on the spot) and commission reports.

The Phelps-Stokes Committee on African