Governor Oluseyi Makinde says his administration has brought back 60,000 out-of-school children to the classroom in the last three and half years, and stabilised academic activities at the First Technical University in Ibadan, Oyo State.
Makinde also said apart from equipping classrooms, the state government equally provided free notebooks and textbooks to ease parents’ burden of sourcing for educational materials for their wards.
“When we came in, I promised to get as many of our students that are out of school back into classrooms.
“And a major impediment was the payment of the N3,000 levy that was imposed. We removed it and between then and now, we have been able to get about 60,000 out-of-school children back into the classrooms.
“In terms of quality, we made a compendium for the students, gave them notebooks, textbooks,” he noted.
Makinde, who spoke to newsmen during his 55th birthday recently, also disclosed that his government has upgraded the Emmanuel Alayande College of Education to a university, and employed over 5,000 teachers.
“When I came in, the First Technical University had issues, but when you buy a company, which is the same as taking over an administration, you take up both the liability and assets and we have been able to stabilise that.
“Recently, we saw the need to upgrade the Emmanuel Alayande College of Education to a University of Education and we did all the necessary things, put all the needed resources to help them function optimally. We have the approval already and we now have a university of education,” he said.
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On why his administration took over the ownership of Ladoke Akintola University, Ogbomoso (LAUTECH), which was before now jointly owned with Osun State; he said when his administration came on board and evaluated the situation of things at the institution, it was discovered that the joint ownership was not working in the best interests of the students.
The governor said as a result of this “students were spending a period of eight years on a five-year programme. “Thankfully, we were able to take sole ownership of LAUTECH and they have continued with more improvement and have taken their destinies into their own hands”, he said.
