•Govt to restore teaching of history in schools
The Federal Government is working towards establishing six new Universities of Science and Technology to expand access to tertiary education, Minister of Education Mallam Adamu Adamu, has said.
Adamu spoke at a News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) forum yesterday in Abuja. He said the future of the world depended on science and technology.
“This government has already decided to even add more; it is going to establish six new Universities of Science and Technology.
“And at the lower level, there will be a technical school in each state and then vocational centres at the wards and local government levels.
“You know, we have a problem of access; if you look at it last year, one million candidates applied for university education but only 150,000 were taken. So, we need to build more universities to create more space for those who want to get in. And the fact that the new universities are science and technology based underscores the decision by the government to lay more emphasis on science.”
He said the universities would be located in the six geo-political zones.
The minister also said steps are on to restore the teaching of history in primary and secondary schools’ curriculum.
“Whoever doesn’t know his history is worse than dead. So, this government is going to bring back history. It would even be better if we study local history first; you have to know who you are before you can be anything in this world.
“I believe this government is going to return history back to the curriculum.”
On the Federal Government’s running of secondary schools, the minister said government could not withdraw from managing unity schools because they are veritable foundations for the promotion of national unity.
“At the moment, the Federal Government is only running unity schools. There should be nothing wrong with that, especially, considering the services they provide.
“Somebody from Badagry would come and be in the same class with somebody in Baga; somebody in Bayelsa with somebody in Gwadaguwa in Sokoto; a nation is being built up at school level”.
Adamu pledged the government’s determination to return universities to the path of attaining excellent global ratings in all fields of academic endeavours.