Posted by Prof. Emmanuel Osodeke, president of the Academic Staff Union of institutions, has warned that if the Federal Government does not stop the continual price hike in the institutions, 40 to 50 percent of students may leave out within the next two years.
On Sunday night, Osodeke made this clear when discussing the state of the Nigerian education system on Channels TV.
He predicted that many children would drop out of school because they couldn’t afford the high fees that were being forced on them nationwide.
He predicted that within three years, 40 to 50 percent of today’s enrolled students would have dropped out of school due to the high costs imposed by schools around the country.
If the widespread student attrition predicted by the head of the universities’ union comes to pass, he says, the country would face a serious challenge.
He thinks that dropping out of school will lead to their being idle, which will leave them vulnerable to bad people.
When they stop going to school, they will be a prime recruiting target for those who seek to make the United States difficult to govern.
To paraphrase: “How can the children of someone who earns N50,000 per month be able to pay such a fee?” “School fees of N300,000, how can the children of someone who earns N50,000 per month pay such a fee?”
On the other hand, he advocated for at least a 15% increase in education funding from the government.
He regretted that education only received 3.8% of the total budget in the previous year, stating that if that percentage were increased, parents wouldn’t have to worry about paying such high school tuition.
His subsequent remarks revealed his pessimism over the success of the government’s approach on student loans. He also mentioned that the loan policy should be examined periodically.
You need to cover all the bases when discussing student loans. Nothing suggests it would be effective.
There should be a checkup. Learn from our mistakes and find out how we can improve the future. However, we propose renaming the transaction from a loan to a grant.
If you examine the terms, you’ll see that 90% of students won’t qualify for that loan. The requirement that your parents’ annual income be less than N500,000 [is severe]. He asked, “How many people make less than N500,000 per year?”