By Safiyanu Ladan
The Kaduna state government has directed teachers in public schools to transit to four days working in a week, which the state adopted last year.
In line with the new arrangement, the teachers will now work from Monday to Thursday instead of Monday to Friday regular routine.
This development has generated a lot of condemnation across the state, as many people fear that it will further cripple the already fragile education system.
According to these critics, Governor El-Rufai had come up with stringent education policies ranging from competency tests for primary school teachers, which saw the sacking of thousands of primary school teachers, to the closure of schools due to the covid-19 pandemic and insecurity.
These aforementioned measures have invariably affected the impartation of knowledge and created a considerable gap that requires concerted effort to fill.
Staying at home during this period created an overwhelming experience for children and parents. It has also affected the way they learn. Having learnt that the future of their children’s education is at stake, parents were left with no other option than to hire private tutors for their wards, as the resumption date was still sketchy.
Noted for being a hub of intellectual activities in Northern Nigeria, the state has recently grappled with reduced access to classroom education due to those challenges.
And now, with this government’s directives of transiting the teacher’s working days to four in a week in place of the regular working days is tantamount to reducing the access to classrooms that has a far reached negative impacts on students.
Given the foregoing, the decision of the government to make teachers in public schools resort to four days working is ill-fated.
Safiyanu Ibrahim wrote from Kaduna via uncledoctor24@gmail.com.