Making the Common Northern Education Compact a reality: Pathway from Niger State, by Usman Sarki

“To this class of enemies belong some of the educated or half-educated Europeanized natives whom our educational and religious system divorces from their race, and who, having no outlet and bereft of national or racial pride, betray the interests of their country into the hands of its foes. ” — E. D. Morel Instilling pride in one’s heritage should be among the purposes of education. A nation does not progress merely by schooling people or subjecting them to rote learning. Education should develop citizens intellectually, morally and practically, making them useful and productive members of their communities. The curriculum must therefore contribute to character formation as much as intellectual development, while connecting learning to the needs of society.

As a retired civil servant and one-time policymaker, I appreciate that ideas become consequential only when translated into institutions, budgets, responsibilities and measurable results. This is particularly true of education. Declarations of emergency, however eloquent, cannot by themselves put a child in school, improve a teacher or ensure that a pupil can read, write, calculate and acquire a useful skill. Nigeria’s National Policy on Education, whose sixth edition was issued in 2013, provides an extensive framework covering the philosophy and goals of education, early childhood development, teacher education, funding, language instruction, skills acquisition, guidance and counselling, open and distance learning, mass literacy and nomadic education. But national policy ultimately succeeds or fails through implementation. Its ambitions must therefore be translated into practical subnational programmes. In the two preceding articles in this series, I argued that education should once again be regarded as a common…