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THE commitment of the government to national education appears to have faltered all along as the number of teachers of English and mathematics in institutions of secondary education has decreased whilst the number of institutions and students has increased over the past 13 years. The results of secondary and higher secondary public examinations make the proposition evident. Education board officials say that most of the unsuccessful candidates in this year’s secondary and higher secondary public examinations have failed in English, taught from pre-primary to higher secondary levels, and mathematics, taught from pre-primary to secondary levels. The number of English teachers in institutions of secondary education has declined by 14,673 and of mathematics teachers by 1,607 from 2011 to 2024 whilst the number of such institutions has increased from 19,070 to 20,631 and the number of students from 7,510,218 to 8,979,009. Official statistics for 2024 show that 59,791 teachers taught English in 20,631 institutions, 2.9 teachers per institution, whilst the figure was 3.9 in 2011 when 74,464 teachers taught English in 19,070 institutions. In 2024, 61,707 teachers taught mathematics in 20,631 institutions, 3.14 teachers per institution, whilst the figure was 3.3 in 2011 when 63,314 teachers taught mathematics in 19,070 institutions.

A slightly increased average of teachers per institution in 2024 compared with 2011 has hardly worked as the number of students per institution increased from 393.82 in 2011 to 435.20 in 2024. Both educationists and educationalists believe that the shortage of teachers has been at the heart of the poor results of public examinations in English and mathematics. They also say that negligence towards the education sector, bureaucratic complexities in teacher appointment, poor salary and benefits for teachers are what stop graduates in the two subjects from taking up teaching, especially in institutions of secondary education, as a profession as they are in high demand in other sectors of the job market. The system, in turn, produces graduates bad at English and mathematics, which significantly harms their employment. In 2024, of all the teachers who taught English, only 9.67 per cent had a master’s degree and 7.32 per cent a bachelor’s degree in English, whilst of all the teachers who taught mathematics, only 7.58 per cent had a master’s degree and 7.08 per cent had a bachelor’s degree in mathematics. It would be an understatement even if the proposition is described as ‘pathetic.’ Some educationists say that students have a fear of English and mathematics which questions the standards of classroom teaching.


The government should, therefore, shore up issues on multiple fronts at a time to improve the situation. It should increase the pay of teachers, reform the teacher recruitment process, ensure a proper assessment of the qualifications of teachers and regularly hold teacher training, especially for English and mathematics, to head off burn-out.