By Muhammad Abdullahi, Abuja
The All Nigeria Confederation of Principals of Secondary Schools (ANCOPSS) has called on African leaders to accord priority attention to secondary education in order to compete favourably with other world system.
The National President of ANCOPSS, Mr Izuagie Anselm, made the call at the Africa Confederation of Principals (ACP) Conference held at the International Conference Centre, Tuesday, in Abuja.
The theme of the conference was,” Achieving Sustainable Quality Secondary Education in Africa.”
Anselm said that secondary school had a natural function of midwifing a smooth educational transition from basic to tertiary, if literacy must be maintained and sustained in Africa for technological and structural advancement.
He, however, said that secondary education was not been given enough attention to perform its role due to systemic failure arising from proper understanding of what education should mean to Africa.
The educationist noted that Africa was rich in all sphere but lack of proper coordination of its interest to compete favourably with other world system.
” Even when there is a realisation of what role secondary education should play in achieving educational development, the will-power is circumspect because of poverty.
” Thus, there is underestimation, sentimentality, lack of focus. The position of Africa as a Third World Continent and a growing economy is also key to Africa’s weak background to establish basic structures to start with.
” There is poor funding leading to poor learning environment and other social divide. The overall importance of secondary education and education generally is commonly overlooked,” he said.
He said that the objective of conference was to explore ways to advice African Governor on how best to harness and harvest secondary education in the continent.
Anselm, however, commended President Muhammadu Buhari giant strides at revamping secondary education in view of its importance in the educational strata.
Earlier, the former President of ANCOPSS, Mrs Fatimah Abdulraman, said the theme of the conference was a reflection for all stakeholders in education sector in Africa to realize that sustainable education had come to stay in the continent.
” If really we want to maintain quality secondary education in Africa and groom our children for higher education all hands must be on deck to put in place what is expected of stakeholders in promoting secondary education.”
Also Sen. Ibrahim Shekarau (APC), representing Kano Central, who said no nation can grow without quality teaching and learning, called on government to increase funding for education sector so that they can catch-up with the new technological advancement in the process of communication and network in the process of teaching and learning.