In the modern era, societies which have achieved great progress have done so with the leverage of education as a foundational pillar. The more education is valued and elevated to priority propagation, the more a society is transformed for the better. It is no surprise that the late former South African president Nelson Mandela once rightly affirmed that education is the most powerful weapon that can be used to change the world. This is also the thinking of Professor Chukwuma Soludo in his ardent quest to implement sound policies that would make education more accessible and reduce the number of out-of-school children, and transform Anambra State for good.
As an educationist par excellence himself, Prof. Soludo’s progressive quest is not just promoting education, but developing robust basic education as a solid foundation. Reassuringly, that noble quest is getting due validation from critical education stakeholders such as Anambra State head teachers who pledged their support to Governor Soludo’s primary education agenda which is being religiously implemented.
The endorsement of the basic education agenda is in order and affirms the position that a properly cultivated basic education system, through primary and secondary schools, is imperative to holistic educational development in modern society.
Indeed, since coming to office on March 17, 2022, Professor Soludo has been phenomenal in his leadership impact on education along with other sectors of the state. For good measure, he has kept zealous faith with his administration’s aim to “develop rigorous quality assurance in both private and public schools”, just as he is delivering on his manifesto in education to “develop the competence of Teachers in the State and restore teaching as a profession of pride.”
By and large, it is Soludo’s strong conviction that a society cannot develop above
its quality of teachers and the quality of teaching. That informs his game-changing action of undertaking a mass, yet painstaking and merit-guided, recruitment of 5000 qualified teachers into the state’s primary and secondary schools in December 2022. The recruitment of teachers into the system was planned to eliminate and end the era of schools without teachers. Because of the value Soludo placed on the teachers, the newly hired teachers received their first salaries in December 2022 along with Christmas bonus allowances.
Without gainsaying, for a new government in less than 10 months to have embarked on such large-scale recruitment of teachers amid competing demands and limited resources is not only commendable but also a reflection of the governor’s serious commitment to engaging education as a tool of social engineering. Further confirmation of Soludo’s revolutionary approach to education is the policy on books to engage quality publishers and authors while ensuring price control to make books affordable. Also, a welcome development is the pre-resumption meeting introduced by his administration to serve as a veritable platform for the exchange of ideas among all stakeholders and the deployment of school inspectors to schools.
When the foregoing positive developments are combined with the teachers being alive to their responsibilities of making primary education attractive with the natural beautification of school environments and inculcation of morality in our children, then basic education as envisioned by Governor Soludo would be engendering genuine social engineering of Anambra State into a smart, livable and thriving mega city-state where opportunities abound. The totality would ensure that education helps us reduce poverty and inequality while equipping individuals with the resourceful capacity to solve problems.
Written by ERNIE ONWUMERE
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