Educational inequity, bane of national development –Folawe Omikunle
Posted by Babalola Sulaimon&Olufunke Owoseni | 2 years ago | 1,160 times
Folawe Omikunle, CEO Teach for Nigeria
By: Sulaimon Babalola, Olufunke Owoseni
The Chief Executive Officer, Teach for Nigeria, Folawe Omikunle, has said that educational inequity is a great injustice to Nigeria's social development, according to her, there's a need to realize the purpose of education.
In an Exclusive Interview with Western Nigeria Publica, Folawe discusses the challenges in the educational system of Nigeria and how her organization has been tackling educational inequity.
In a recent report, Nigeria has about 10.5 million out of school children. This has however been a concern for the government and a number of private and non-profit organizations and has spurred quite a number of reasonable actions such as increment in the budget allocated to the education sector from 5.7% to 7.2% by the government and quite a number of resourceful and impactful programs launched by non-profit and private organizations all in a bid to bring these children to school.
Asked what can be done to bring back these kids, Folawe said: "the only solution to this is to first understand the root causes of educational inequity.
"These children are out of school for a number of reasons which could either be due to issues in their state or localities, proximity, poverty, socio-cultural beloved, physiological challenges or lack of motivation among others. Each one of these reasons needs to be looked into before a sustainable solution can be proffered."
The educationist disclosed that the disparity in the quality of education between rich and the poor pupils, as well as income inequality, is responsible for the incidence of crime, poverty and injustice in the country.
"Education is not a way to escape poverty, it is a way of fighting it. Economic inequality is growing and the kind of education system a country has will have a major impact on the capacity to respond to this. Access to good quality education for individual children offers a pathway to liberation from poverty and illness, towards the fulfillment of basic rights."
Folawe noted that a good- quality public education is liberating for individuals, adding that quality education will tackle the growing inequality and bring everyone closer together with the help of transformational leaders.
According to her, education must be of good quality and equitable. Education is universal regardless of its diversity, it should be adequately funded with well supported teachers and accountable public oversight.
Speaking further, the CEO said Inequality is not inevitable, it is the result of deliberate policy choices made by the governments and international organizations.
"There can be no contentment for any of us when there are children,millions of children who do not receive an education that provides them with dignity and honor that allows them to live their lives to the full "Nelson Mandela".
Working towards the vision that " One day, every Nigerian child will have the opportunity to attain an excellent education," Folawe said Teach for Nigeria exists because millions of children in Nigeria lack access to an excellent education that will give them a successful future.
"The organization is breaking the barriers to education inequity and changing the narrative by recruiting promising future leaders from varied disciplines to teach in Nigeria underserved schools," she added.
