Teach for Nigeria, a non-profit organisation focused on eliminating educational inequity in Nigeria by placing future leaders to teach in underserved schools in low-income communities celebrated its five years anniversary on Wednesday, February 9, 2022.
Folawe Omikunle, the chief executive officer of Teach for Nigeria in her speech expressed her joy for the success recorded by the organisation so far within the first five years.
“I’m pleased to see the incredible achievements of Teach for Nigeria in the last five years. For me, it is really an incredible and impressive result,” she said.
Omikunle disclosed that the vision and some of the motivation that led to the start of the Teach for Nigeria is the burden to see every child in Nigeria get excellent education by developing and mobilising teachers to ensure educational equity in the country.
“Teach for Nigeria is focused on developing a movement of leaders across the nation who are committed to putting an end to educational inequity,” Omikunle said.
The educationist reiterated that Teach for Nigeria is committed to recruiting able teachers who are willing and able to teach anywhere in the country as their contributions to eradicating illiteracy in Nigeria.
Read also: Nigeria, leading Africa’s economy with a poor education sector
According to Omikunle, “Teach for Nigeria recruits Nigeria’s brightest and most outstanding future leaders from varied disciplines to teach in Nigeria’s underserved schools in low-income communities through a highly selective, two-year fellowship.”
She explained that the approach of the organisation is a long time change system geared towards developing a strong education system and grooming the best hands in the business of knowledge transfer in Nigeria.
Omikunle revealed that Teach for Nigeria is projected to raise more than 20,000 teachers in the next 5years. Already the group has over 245 alumni across the country.
Alero Ayida-Otobo, a board member of Teach for Nigeria in her address applauded the CEO for her power of possibilities philosophy that has taken the organisation to an enviable height today as it were.
“I want to say that I’m really glad that I have Folawe on the team. Sometimes you have to feel the impact to appreciate the efforts. We are where we are today because one life is touched.
Every child impacted in another 10 years becomes an adult that can impact others. This is what is called a phenomenal increase. Speaking when the organisation started, she noted that all to succeed is to take the first step, just as the Chinese proverbs stated.
She recounted the ugly state of the country’s education system in 2016 when the idea was being incubated. We had a 60percent of children in Nigeria primary schools that were not learning.
The sad story was 9 out of 10 children out of the sub -Sahara Africa according to the World Bank data could not read and write compared to 1 out of 10 children in America and other developed countries.
Ayida-Otobo advocated that improving the ecosystem of any country starts with impacting the teachers, hence, she called for improved welfare and training of teachers.
“When you transform teachers, you transform the nation; teachers training, teachers’ development, and well-being is the solution to the education crisis in Nigeria,” she said.
Edikan Mbang unveiled the massive growth of the organisation since 2017 when it started. According to Mbang, “Teach for Nigeria has impacted over 600 students and over 100,000 fellows in Lagos and Ogun States who are impacted on teaching methodology and other necessary academic approaches to improve their persons.”
He explained further that the organisation’s growth over the years has seen a massive increase of 750 fellows in the programme in 2021, and over 109,505 fellows today.
Abdullahi Ibrahim, an alumnus of Teach for Nigeria recounted his gains for joining the group some years back after his National Youth Service.
Ibrahim disclosed that the group has been able to train more than 4,000 teachers in the northern region of Nigeria who are able to train others.
