ENHANCING THE QUALITY OF PRIMARY EDUCATION IN NIGERIA: CHALLENGES FOR MORE EFFECTIVE EDUCATIONAL ADMINISTRATION

ENHANCING THE QUALITY OF PRIMARY EDUCATION IN NIGERIA: CHALLENGES FOR MORE EFFECTIVE EDUCATIONAL ADMINISTRATION

Primary education is the deliberate process about opportunity for learning in the child at the preparation stage in the school. A public primary school in Nigeria is an elementary school supported by public funds characterized by free tuition fee, centrally run by boards and adjusting management styles for improved service delivery at any level of education meant to deliver some dividends. Any form of education lacking those dividends has no quality. Meanwhile, quality primary education in Nigeria is determined by considering the extent to which school curriculum, teachers, students, teaching-learning materials, learning time, teaching practice, educational administration and community services are available, adequate and accessible. In the context of this article, educational administration is seen as the process of mobilizing and utilizing scarce human and physical resources for the achievement of educational objectives. After a thorough examination of the administrative status of primary education in Nigeria, the following administrative issues are found to be challenges: funding primary education, quality and quantity of teachers, professionalization of teaching, availability of learning/teaching facilities and supervision of instruction. Arising from the above, one may wish to recommend as follows: restructuring the financing of primary education. The end-result of overdependence on government as source of funding has been monumental failure. For the purpose of raising quality teachers, we should raise standard of our teacher education and regularly organize in-service programmes for those already in service, professionalization of teaching to raise teachers’ status, provision of instructional materials and physical facilities and efforts should be made to initiate and sustain supervision in our schools on regular basis. Implementation of these recommendations among others will enhance the quality of primary education, thereby making public primary schools’ environment conducive for children education in Nigeria.