LASU VC wants more funds channelled to education

The Vice Chancellor, Lagos State University, Prof Olanrewaju Fagbohun, on Wednesday said more funds should be channelled to the education sector to enable the country to meet up with global standards.

Fagbohun made the call while delivering the main lecture for the celebration of the 55th birthday of Mr Lanre Ogunyemi, Chairman, Lagos State House of Assembly Committee on Education, in Lagos.

Fagbohun said that improved funding that would lead to e-infrastructure as well as better training/remuneration for teachers was imperative to move the nation forward.

Speaking on the the theme “Attaining Global Education Quality Standards: Prospects and Challenges of Achieving United Nations Funding Target in Nigeria”, he noted that many nations of the world had left Nigeria behind.

“When we look at education in Nigeria, we are seriously challenged.

“We don’t see faculty members coming from Ghana, Kenya and other countries into Nigeria. But we see Nigerian faculty members going into other countries.

“We don’t see students from these other countries coming to Nigeria. But we see Nigerian students going into these other countries.

“In Ghana alone we have 13,000 Nigerian students, over 4000 in Malaysia; it means there is something we are not doing right that we need to correct.

“There is a need to fund education in a much deeper way,” he said.

Fagbohun said he once did a survey on 800 universities globally ranked.

“What is it that they have that we don’t have and I found out that e-infrastructure was common to all of them.

“It is important to take ICT very seriously. We need to expose our children to ICT to give them access to variety of information.

“Inclusive and quality education is a fundamental human right, it is not a privilege. It is a right in the Sustainable Development Goals,” he said.

Fagbohun decried the inability of Nigerian Universities to be among the leading 1000 Universities in the world.

He said that the nation’s Universities failed abysmally to attract foreign faculty members and international students due to fallen standard.

The vice chancellor, however, commended the state government for its commitment to education, which had led to huge investment in infrastructure.

Fagbohun called on the government to embark on aggressive e-infrastructure for all its tertiary institutions, for them to compete globally.

He urged wealthy individuals to support education to raise the standard.

In his comments, the celebrant, Ogunyemi, representing Ojo Constituency II in the Assembly, said that the country could not continue to do the same thing the same way and expect different results.

“The world is moving and education is dynamic.

“World over now, there is so much emphasis on less of theoretical learning and more of self learning.

“There is a paradigm shift now from less of teachers teaching and more of the learner learning and discovering by themselves, and e-learning is the key now globally.

“Our children must be internet savvy.

“E-learning is the way and we should deemphasize chalk board teaching. We are trying to introduce Ibile Tablet in Lagos.

“We need to do more to move our education from pedestrian level to the height of e-learning, and the government must do a lot of investment in that direction,” he said.

The programme had the Speaker of Lagos State House of Assembly, Mr Mudashiru Obasa, as Chairman, while the Governor of the State of Osun, Raufu Aregbesola, delivered the keynote address.

Educational stakeholders from the State Universal Basic Education Board (SUBEB), State Teaching Service Commission (TESCOM) and academia were amongst the guests at the event.