Of education policy and image in Nigeria education system

Your comment captured the reasons parents send their children to school in Africa-to be better than them on the social ladder. I am surprised but not too surprised anyway that the same reasons obtain in developed countries. In developing countries especially those in Africa the reasons have not changed. Parent could go as far selling farmland, clothes etc to see children through school. Having said that the image problem with TVET has not changed till date. In Nigeria government pay TVET professionals lower than their counterparts, there is a ceiling on their career development and also entry requirements to get into vocational schools are lower than other professions outside of vocational education. They are paid lower than other professionals and this is despite that government is saying that they want to develop the industrial base of the economy. One of the ways of solving image problems for TVET is to have place policies that will give them equal career and job opportunities in and outside the school because to say there is no image problem is not to face the reality on ground. Recently university of Lagos ask for higher National diploma(HND) certificate as one of the requirements into their foundation programmes. HND are usually what TVET schools offer and it is pathetic that after rigorous academic work in a field it is still seen as entry requirement to read another four year degree programme in the same field. The attitude of those in Universities towards TVET qualifications need to change and if this means changes in curriculum so be it but as it is in Nigeria academic workload is the same almost in all cases and HND courses have additional practical requirements to meet. Until these issues are addressed image problem will persist. An HND holder in Nigeria even when better than their degree counterparts on a job is paid less and even when he has more experiences than a degree holder he may never be allowed to head his department. If I may add, a four year national certificate of education holder will need to spend another four to five years in order to obtain a first degree in Nigerian Universities. Most times they repeat courses, waste time without reason. That is what we have in Nigeria.