The National Senior Secondary Education Commission (NSSEC) has rolled out the National Minimum Standards for secondary education, with a charge to state governments to implement the same in line with the ongoing reform in the subsector.

Executive Secretary of the Commission, Dr. Iyela Ajayi, who stated this in a chat in Abuja, said that NSSEC is determined to reshape the sector through standards enforcement, teacher development, digital expansion, and infrastructure upgrades.

“The National Minimum Standards has to do with benchmarking requirements for all aspects of secondary education. How many teachers do you have? What should be their qualification? What should be the teacher-student ratio? The infrastructures that you have on ground, among others.

“The type of buildings you have, the quality of the buildings, all these are clearly spread out in the Minimum Standards.

“We have developed the Minimum Standards and it was launched in February this year, and we have distributed the Minimum Standards to all the states of the Federation.

“We have given them 12 months within which to comply, because the law establishing this commission has not only given us the power to produce Minimum Standards, but to enforce it. So, we have given them 12 months to comply,” he said.

“There must be standards and uniformity. We cannot continue with a situation where students learn under trees or in classrooms without roofs. Those days must end,” he added.

Ajayi explained that the commission is also intensifying efforts to raise teacher quality through continuous professional development, including training programmes for English and Mathematics teachers and capacity building on AI-driven teaching methods for educators and school administrators.

He outlined NSSEC’s priority areas to include ongoing teacher training, recruitment and retention of qualified teachers, digital learning and ICT integration, and large-scale infrastructure rehabilitation.

Other focal points, he said, are technical and vocational education, inclusive learning for girls and persons with disabilities, curriculum reforms centred on practical skills, and improved school governance.

On curriculum changes, he emphasised NSSEC’s role in recent national adjustments involving the reintroduction of History, reduction of curriculum overload, and expansion of skill-based learning.

Despite financial constraints, the NSSEC boss said the Commission has facilitated the upgrade of 50 senior secondary schools, at least one in each state, through constituency projects.

“These include new classrooms, laboratories and ICT facilities. We are not yet like UBEC but the little we have done is already changing the narrative,” he said.

Ajayi revealed that NSSEC is also engaging telecom firms for subsidised broadband access in schools and working with development partners to secure 30,000 tablets for teachers nationwide.

According to him, plans are also underway to make computer literacy compulsory for all students and expand offerings in robotics, artificial intelligence and data science. (Nigerian Tribune)