Gombe State Governor, Inuwa Yahaya says reform of the education sector since 2019 has improved students’ performance in the West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE) in the state.
Governor Yahaya said this in Gombe on Friday at the presentation of appointment letters to the 1, 000 newly recruited secondary school teachers in the state.
He said since his assumption of office in 2019, there had been an improvement in candidates’ performance in WASSCE from 31 per cent to 73 per cent.
According to him, his administration has made great progress in the education sector,p through the bold reforms and massive investments we made.
He said that one of policies and interventions was the reintroduction of Mock Examinations across the state.
“This helped increase the percentage of candidates in our public schools who passed WASSCE with above five credits including Mathematics and English from 31 per cent in 2019 to 73 per cent in 2021.”
The governor said the needs assessment study conducted in 2019 revealed that most schools, especially in rural areas, lacked trained teachers.
According to him, more than 32 per cent of teachers in primary schools did not have the minimum teaching qualification (NCE).
He said that most schools in the state were without essential teaching and learning facilities which resulted to high degree of absenteeism and dropout rates.
“Another challenge, we inherited is 48 per cent out-of-school children, one of the highest in the country.
“A rapid decline in primary school net attendance rates from 55.5 per cent in 2008 to 40.5 per cent in 2018 is one indicator of this worrying trend.”
Yahaya said based on the challenges his administration inherited in the education sector, he declared a state-of-emergency in the sector, followed by a 60 per cent increase in capital allocation in the 2020 and 2021 budgets.
He said through the increase in budgetary allocations to the sector, more than 1,327 classrooms were either built or renovated, furnished and equipped.
Yahaya said his administration in an effort to improve the quality of teaching in schools across the state trained hundreds of teachers at the modern Teacher Resource Centre established by the state government.
“In order to maintain our teachers’ expertise for quality education, we also approved the promotion of 1,578 teachers as well as the transfer of 288 graduate teachers from LGEAs (SUBEB) to the Ministry of Education.”
To the recruited teachers, the governor said his administration had a zero-tolerance policy to indolence, lateness, corruption, indiscipline and inefficiency.
Speaking on behalf of the physically-challenged teachers recruited among the 1,000, Ibrahim Abubakar said the governor had done well by ensuring that his members were considered for recruitment.
Abubakar said the gesture would help ensure inclusiveness in the education sector as well as give his members a sense of belonging.(NAN)
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