Technical Teacher Training Programme (TTTP): Who will give us scholarship again?
By Prince Olalekan Olagunju
The birth of western education in Nigeria is associated with the coming of European missionaries in the mid- nineteenth century. The first mission school was founded in 1843 by Methodists, but it was the Anglican Church Missionary Society that pushed forward in the early 1850s to create a chain of missions and schools, followed quickly in the late 1850s by the Roman Catholics.
By 1914, when north and south were united into one colony, there were fifty-nine government and ninety-one mission primary schools in the south; all eleven secondary schools, except for King’s College in Lagos, were run by the missions. By the time the country marched towards independence, it had gone through a decade of exceptional educational growth leading to a movement for universal primary education in the Western Region.
In my formative years as a young adult in the early 1980s, I had been fortunate to participate in the Nigerian Television Authority (NTA) Channel 10 programme in Lagos, called “Puppets Play House”. My roles in the troop were manipulation of puppets, singing of cultural and African folklore songs; and local and foreign rhymes. The puppets plays were educative, informative and entertaining which fascinated people of different age groups, such as children, youths and adults.
This golden opportunity came my way at the National Museum at Lagos Island. As at then, federal government of Nigeria was so magnanimous toward talented or creative youths to develop their innate capabilities and proficiencies with free use of “Fine and Applied Art Materials” provided at the museum. To their credit and admiration, the Curator and staff members were wonderful people in the discharge of their enviable services.
Luckily, during the era of Alhaji Shehu Usman Aliyu Shagari GCFR of blessed memory, a national scholarship and audition window was opened through the National Theatre at Iganmu, for Nigerian youths to secure scholarship to study theatre arts in various overseas institutions. Happily, about 3 members of our trope (Puppet Play House) gained federal government scholarship to study Puppetry in Bulgaria; that was about 40 year ago which can be termed “the good, good old days”.
For technical and vocational education, it can be dated back to pre and post-colonial era as initiated by the missionaries; while federal government started the initiative in 1970 to promote acquisition of technical and vocational knowledge and skills, in agreement with the National Policy on Education (NPE).
To commend federal government efforts toward fast tracking implementation of the TTTP, report said Nigeria signed a bilateral agreement with government of the United States in 1981 to train 500 technical teachers annually for a period of 10 years. To the best of my knowledge, the programme was a huge success before overseas training was stopped.
In 2001, I was fortunate with many teachers across the federation awarded TTTP scholarships to study at various postgraduate levels, such as technical teacher certificate in education, diplomas, first degrees, masters and up to PhD in Nigeria institutions. Without reservation, I will always be grateful to God, Lagos State government and the federal government of Nigeria.
Now, we can briefly highlight the accruable benefits of technical teachers training and technical and vocational education to us as a nation. First of all, we should note that it is rightly said that “no nation can rise above the level of its teachers”, that is, you cannot give what you do not have. Hence, Nigeria teachers need encouragement, development and understanding.
Technical/Vocational education is expected to provide trained manpower in applied sciences, technology and business mainly at craft, advanced craft and technical levels; provide technical knowledge and vocational skills necessary for engineering, Information Communication Technology (ICT), Artificial Intelligence (AI) agricultural, commercial and economic development; impact required skills in individuals who will be economically self-reliant. It may be applied as Pre-vocational, Vocational, Technical College, College of Education (Technical), Polytechnic and University.
Reactivating the TTTP scheme would impart technical knowledge and vocational skills in students thereby contributing to the economic development of the country. Nigeria must produce graduates who will compete favourably in the labour market as well as being self-reliant. The Federal and state governments should start to resuscitate technical teacher training programme (TTTP) in order to produce more teachers for technical and vocational education for the needed manpower to move Nigeria to higher science and technology pedestals.
It should be noted that Technical Teachers Training Programme matters; and repositioning of Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) is germane now, as we are looking for who will give us scholarship again.
Olagunju writes from Crawford University, Igbesa, Ogun State South West, Nigeria
