The Registrar and Chief Executive of Teachers Registration Council of Nigeria (TRCN), Prof. Olusegun Ajiboye, yesterday said over 1,500,000 persons have been registered as professional teachers in the country.
He said the registration was still ongoing, adding that teachers without requisite certificates would soon be disengaged.
The TRCN chief said the National Certificate in Education (NCE) remained the minimum qualification for teachers.
Ajiboye spoke as a guest lecturer at the World Teacher’s Day celebration organised by the Adeyemi College of Education (ACE), Ondo chapter of Colleges of Education Academic Staff Union (COEASU).
The expert said the recent establishment of the Council had brought impetus to teacher professional drive through the legal instrument and professionalised ethical status.
But he noted that there were some grey areas which, with prompt approach by TRCN, would become history and teachers would be respected and given better remuneration.
Ajiboye said: “Nigerian teachers can only improve if the dignity and prestige the teacher had in the past is restored. Technology is on the high side, and any educational system that does not key into it shall be left behind…
“It is a truism that teachers in the past played major roles in stabilising the society, but their role and activities cannot be equated to be that of a professional.”
The college Provost Prof Olukoya Ogen said any behaviour among the school’s workers, which ridiculed teaching, would no longer be tolerated.
Ogen, who was represented by his deputy, Dr S.A Akintunde, advised academic staffers to embrace best practices in the teaching profession.