What are the signs available in the society that a given society or nation has the quality and functional education? I will be sharing twenty points under the indicators of quality and functional education. These are:
i. Rate of Literacy in a given country or location
The bane of the current African education is that schools promote pupils who can’t read, write and do basic arithmetic to middle basic education and worst still graduate them as having completed basic education. For example, a 2018 World Bank Report revealed that over 80% of pupils leaving primary schools in Nigeria couldn’t read. “Among young adults in Nigeria, only about 20 per cent of those who complete primary education can read.” Consider countries like Andorra with 100% literacy and Finland while the UK and the United States stand at 99%, Russia and Ukraine’s literacy rate is 99.7%, Israel 97.8 and Singapore 95.9%, etc. In Africa, the rate of literacy of selected countries stands at South Africa 92.9%, Zimbabwe at 83.6%, Kenya at 72.2%, Ghana at 71.5%, Sao Tome and Principe at 69.5%, Senegal at 52.1% and Nigeria at 51.1%. The literacy level of any country is an indicator of how quality and function of its education.
ii. Quality of Teachers
The teachers are education engineers and architects. To grow and develop education in any country; quality and professionalism in teaching are of utmost priority. Teachers are first on the agenda of any nation that wants to make progress and profit from education. My findings from nations with the highest literacy rate revealed that they take their teaching force as important as their main sources of revenue. They invest in their training programmes, make a good selection of who should go to the class and teach and equally give them high motivation in terms of salaries and other incentives. Take Finland, Andorra, the UK, the US, Russia, Singapore, etc as case studies; their teachers are always proud to be teachers and would desire to always be teachers. A report from Finland reveals that most teachers in Finland would prefer to be primary school teachers than teachers at any other level of education. “High-quality teachers are the hallmark of Finland’s education system. Annual national opinion polls have repeatedly shown that teaching is Finland’s most admired profession, and primary school teaching is the most sought-after career”.
In a 2013 survey conducted on teachers’ rating among twenty-one world’s best economies by Professor Peter Dolton and Dr Oscar Marcenaro-Gutierrez published by Varkey GEM Foundation; the following are the results:
1. The status of headteachers is higher in the UK than in any of the other countries polled.
2. Parents in China, South Korea, Turkey and Egypt are most likely to encourage children to become teachers. Whereas parents in Israel, Portugal, Brazil and Japan are least likely to provide positive encouragement. The UK scored in the middle.
3. Teacher salaries are at their highest in Singapore, with an average of $45,755, South Korea, USA, Germany and Japan are all above $40,000. The UK is at $33,377.
4. People in 95% of the countries polled support a higher salary for teachers than they currently earn. However, Japan, France and the US judge that teachers’ pay is between 6% and 55% higher than is considered fair.
5. Across Europe there are higher levels of pessimism on students’ respect for teachers than in Asia and the Middle East. In China, 75% of respondents believe that students respect teachers, compared to an average of 27% per country.
6. In all 21 countries, more than 59% of people think teachers ought to be paid according to the performance of their pupils. The average across countries was 75%.
7. Opinion was divided on the influence teaching unions have over teacher’s pay and conditions. In the UK and many European countries, the majority of people support unions having a greater influence. However, countries where there is the most recent history of teacher unrest – such as Japan, Greece, France and the US – believe unions have too much influence.
8. In the UK, the actual wage of teachers is lower than what people perceive to be fair. Respondents thought teachers ought to be awarded pay that is 15% more than current teacher wages. Some 74% of respondents thought teachers should be paid according to their pupils’ results.
9. Finland, Switzerland and Singapore have the most faith in their education system, and South Korea, Egypt and Japan have the least. The UK comes seventh.
10. Teachers are given satisfactory or positive trust ratings in every country polled. The average trust rating is 6.3 out of 10 and no country gave a rating below five. Finland and Brazil have the most trust in their teachers. While Israel, South Korea, Egypt and Japan hold the least.
The African nations especially Nigeria should learn from the world-leading nations. This is because Nigerian governments maltreat primary school teachers and politicize teaching appointments. In fact, in some parts of the country, we have some teachers in primary schools who are struggling to read and write. This is why some of them collect bribes from students to help them pass WAEC, NECO and JAMB. It was reported during the era of delayed salaries and percentage payment that in a public school in Nigeria; a pupil was asked: 3+3? He said “33”! and the teacher responded: “It shall remain 33 until our salaries are paid”. What do you expect of a country that politicizes education and teaching that even security without an ‘O’ level result earns more than a teacher with a degree and cognate teaching experience? The quality of any nation’s teachers determines the growth, and development of her education and literacy rate.
iii. Quality of Instructional Materials
Of course, the quality of the instructional materials of any given school’s system depends on the intellectualism of the author, and his or her ability to know what should be taught. For example, if a writer of a subject is a product of a teacher who is a product of examination malpractice; invariably he is a carrier of the EIV/AIDS2 virus and would be deficient in the subject mastery. For instance, I supervised a classroom teacher who was taking primary five division of fractions; I observed that during his teaching of this topic, he skipped an important illustration which is very fundamental to the understanding of that topic. You can’t teach the division of fractions without mentioning “The Law of Reciprocal” because until you convert or change the DIVISION to MULTIPLICATION you can’t solve the Division of Fractions in any mathematical calculation. The teacher got a wrong answer without his knowledge due to the wrong application of a principle. I invited him corrected him and requested him to go back to the classroom and affect the correction with the pupils who have been imparted wrongly. I asked him to also give me the textbook he used; when I went through the Mathematic Textbook, I discovered The Law of Reciprocal wasn’t treated by the author. Quality instructional material is not in the quality of design, paper grammage, or colourization but rather in the relevance of the content.
iv. Rate of Self-Reliance
The number of people who go to school and can survive in society with or without a government job is a reflection of the quality and functional education. People who receive quality and functional education are people who have been exposed to the challenges of their environments and are equally developed skill-wise to proffer solutions to humanity’s problems. The political, social and economic environments should be friendly for the survival of the individuals.
v. Entrepreneur Activities
In a seminar at the US Embassy during the 2018 Open Educational Resource Week; the facilitator asked the participants: “If you were to go back to school and take a course afresh; which course would you go for”? Most of the participants said: “Entrepreneur”! Quality and Functional education produce committed entrepreneurs and not those who out of no government job decided to do a business pending the arrival of the government job.
vi. Unemployment Rate
Quality and functional education are for capacity building. It is that kind of education that helps an individual discover his potential and opens his mind towards understanding the environment he lives. People are bound to decide between solving society’s problems when their capacity is measured to tackle them. The better the education; the reduced unemployment rate. Unemployable which is worse than unemployment is the bane of dysfunctional education.
vii. Sectors Productivity and Growth
When capacity is low; the productivity in that sector would be automatically low and growth would be impeded. Where there is high productivity and growth it is a reflection of the quality and functional education prevailing in the society.
viii. Access and Equity
Access, Equity and Quality are trilateral components of any well-meaning education. Quality and functional education as a complete or holistic education which offers all person the opportunity to develop their latent abilities would be highly patronized by the community. Where there is quality education the indicator is ACCESS AND EQUITY.
“Quality of schools and the processes therein impinge on the levels and nature of participation and completion of basic education by children”. The argument proposed, underscores educational quality as central and the motivator to why children attend school, relegating to the side-lines other explanatory factors such as poverty and social-cultural issues. To sustainably achieve educational access and provide an equitable educational system, the key takeaway is to improve the quality of education provided within schools…” Justin D. Pereira (2016)
ix. National Consciousness
The pride and joy of belongings should be built in any citizen whose nation has been giving quality and functional education. There should be a common aspiration and desire to build a nation for every citizen. If citizens are careless and unpatriotic about their nation; ask the educational leadership.
What are we building through education?
x. Relative Growth in Peace
Quality and functional education should promote internal peace. A society where there is a frequent internal crisis is a failed society in the delivery of quality and functional education.
xi. Improvement in Health Services
There cannot be growth and development in education without the same in the health of the people. When people are sound in their minds; their bodies tell. Quality and functional education based on its rich contents could affect people’s health positively. An educated individual knows what to eat, when to eat, where to eat and how to eat, etc. Cases of sickle cell anaemia, HIV/AIDS, etc are reduced in an enlightened and educated society because of awareness gotten through quality education. Nations like France, Italy, Singapore, Australia, Andorra, and Greece are healthier because of the quality and functional education they enjoy. Improvement in the health of the people is an indicator of quality and functional education in place.
xii. Cultural Awareness
Western education does no ill or evil to African nations but rather a lot of goodies. However, the African’s leader poor skills in harnessing properly the instrumentality of Western education for the good of the land make it difficult to profit from the adopted system of education. Any education system adopted which makes the people lose their cultural heritage is an instrument of enslavement. UNESCO through its programmes across the global world promotes people’s cultures.
xiii. Care Awareness
Human beings are interdependent on one another. Life is better when we show others how much we love and care.
xiv. Religious Tolerance/Spiritual Awareness
Tolerance is a virtue that can foster a better relationship and understanding of one another. The power of quality and functional education is that it exposes recipients to a better way of thought and enables them to understand the universe in a better way. People should acknowledge the fact that there is a supreme being (God Almighty) who can make or mar the existence of any nation. Man is more of a spiritual being than a physical being.
xv. Hate Speeches Controlled
“Is speech that attacks a person or group based on attributes such as race, religion, ethnic origin, national origin, sexual, orientation, disability, or gender”. Well-educated people are unique beings because the quality and functional education they acquire are blended with the necessary ingredients to control their speeches.
xvi. Value and Ethics Compliance
Value is what distinguishes an animal from inanimate beings. Developed nationals are people of high values system and they are at the same time ethic compliant. Quality and functional education should be blended with positive values and ethics. People without ethics and positive values are devoid of quality and functional education.
xvii. Loyal and Patriotic Citizens
Loyalty and patriotism are two keywords that spell out nationalists. Quality and functional education should produce loyal and patriotic citizens. The higher the loyalty and patriotism of any nation’s citizens the quality and function of their education.
xviii. Reduced in Crime Rate
The rate of crime in any nation is a signal of the richness of their education and the government’s commitment to citizens’ welfare. Nations like Sweden, Austria, Switzerland, Germany, Norway, Denmark, Iceland, Japan, Luxembourg and Singapore are top ten with the lowest crime rates in the world.
xix. Quality Leadership and Legislation
Quality leadership is not about clueless cabal but rather one that understands the needs and technical know-how of making sure both human and material resources are efficiently utilized. A quality leader is a product of quality and functional education. They make laws that help the nation achieve its developmental goals by making sure every school-age child is found in the school, etc.
xx. Balance of Payment
It is the difference between the receipts and payments from one country to another. Efficient international trade is when an individual country has a comparative advantage over another nation; that is country “A” specializes in a product that country “B” doesn’t have in a large quantity and country “B” specializes in the product country “B” doesn’t have in a large quantity. Because quality and functional education develop our potential and leadership prowess as a nation; therefore, value for locally made products and services should be highly encouraged. If our value for foreign goods and services is high; then our education is ineffective. When all we need is foreign currencies and no person wants Naira then we can be plunged into economic crisis and debt burden in the short run.
By Davidcrown W. A. Oyebisi
