Nigeria’s education is failing—Not its teachers - Businessday NG

BusinessDay
Oluwafemi Mayowa Olusola
June 11, 2025
Inspired by Olasunkanmi Opeifa’s post on the state of Nigerian education on LinkedIn
When Mrs Ifeoma Eze began teaching biology at a public secondary school in Anambra State over 15 years ago, she believed she was answering a lifelong calling. She recalls the excitement of standing before her first class, armed with chalk, boundless passion, and dreams of shaping the future. Today, that fire is fading. Like many educators across Nigeria, she is not tired of teaching; she is simply tired of surviving.
“We’re not losing teachers to better opportunities,” she says. “We’re losing them to survival.”

That sentiment reflects a deeper dysfunction in Nigeria’s education sector, one that policymakers have long ignored. Across the country, teachers are exiting the system in droves, not in pursuit of foreign jobs or career changes, but in search of dignity, respect, and sanity.
In a widely shared post on LinkedIn, Olasunkanmi Opeifa, the celebrated Maltina Teacher of the Year and an education advocate, summed it up succinctly: “The most innovative teachers I know are the ones leaving. Not because they weren’t good enough, but because they were too good for a broken system that kept clipping their wings. Nigeria’s education sector doesn’t need patchwork. It needs a rebuild. And that starts with listening to the ones in the trenches.”

Those trenches are marked by overwork, underpayment, and institutional neglect. According to a 2023 report by the Nigeria Union of Teachers (NUT), attrition rates among public school teachers in some states have become dangerously high. Niger and Bayelsa states recorded teacher exits of 47.5 percent and 14.2 percent, respectively, over recent multi-year periods. Another joint study in Rivers and Anambra states attributes the exodus primarily to burnout and poor working conditions, not a lack of dedication.
The consequences of this teacher drain are compounded by a growing shift to online teaching platforms. Edtech solutions like Tuteria, uLesson, and Afrilearn have given many educators a temporary lifeline. These platforms offer more autonomy, better income, and a sense of creative freedom. But as promising as this digital migration seems, experts are beginning to question its sustainability. “There’s a difference between building a profession and building a hustle,” says Adeolu Adesina, an edtech consultant based in Lagos. “Many teachers are earning more now, but without structure, regulation, or a pathway to scale, it’s not a career. It’s gig work disguised as progress.”
Read also: The great betrayal: How Nigeria is setting its students up to fail
This shift may be masking a deeper crisis, one in which teachers who should be building legacies are instead scrambling for survival. Many lack retirement plans, professional development opportunities, or even basic health coverage. The system has pushed them from passion to hustle, from purpose to precarity.
Elvis Boniface, founder of the education media platform Edugist, highlights that this trend is not unique to Nigeria. “The teacher exit is actually a global problem. My only wish is how best it’d be if some of these teachers were employed by EdTech companies as key actors in the design of teaching and learning solutions, where their experience and pedagogical knowledge would be handy, as opposed to most of them just being third-party vendors.”

Indeed, Boniface’s vision points to a necessary recalibration. Instead of marginalising seasoned teachers in favour of sleek platforms, edtech companies could better integrate pedagogical expertise into their product teams—offering both meaningful roles and sustainable pathways for professional teachers.
And while online teaching rises, the traditional school model is buckling under pressure. Public confidence in Nigeria’s education system is eroding. Widespread examination malpractice, outdated syllabi, and the dominance of rote learning continue to alienate both students and parents.
“We ask students to define photosynthesis in a world experiencing climate disasters,” says Mr Olabode Abiola, a curriculum development expert. “We should be asking, “How can understanding photosynthesis help address food shortages in your community?’ That’s what relevance looks like.”

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This disconnection between knowledge and real-world application lies at the heart of the crisis. Nigeria’s curriculum has become a time capsule, frozen in outdated assessments while the world gallops forward.
Yet perhaps the most dangerous trend is not the teachers leaving but those who remain—trapped in cycles of stagnation. A recent study published in the Nigerian Journal of Educational Research found that nearly 68 percent of long-serving teachers in Oyo and Kaduna states reported feeling “professionally stuck”. These are educators who entered the system with purpose but have now grown disillusioned.

“After 12 years in this profession, I began asking myself, am I still growing? Or am I just going through the motions?” confesses Chinyere Ogundele, a primary school teacher in Ogun State.
Reviving the system must begin at its roots: with the institutions that train teachers. Nigeria’s Colleges of Education, once the pride of the profession, are now plagued by funding gaps, outdated methodology, and irrelevance. Without a complete overhaul of these institutions, starting with how teachers are prepared, mentored, and supported, the system will keep producing educators unequipped to solve modern classroom challenges.
“Today, we push tools and platforms at teachers,” Opeifa adds. “But very few ask, ‘What problem are we solving? We don’t need more vendors. We need creators: people who’ve stood in the classroom and know what it needs.”
That shift, from passive consumption to problem-solving creation, is where the hope lies. Teachers must be empowered not only as instructors but also as intrapreneurs: innovators solving problems from within, whether in physical classrooms or online communities.
Dr Adeleke S. Adesina, an education policy analyst, puts it plainly: “The educational systems truly need transformers—who are ready to do all it takes for the great change.”

And that change must go beyond teachers. It demands bold leadership, collaborative reform, and policies that value teachers not as expendable labour but as nation-builders.
The next phase of Nigerian education will not be led by landlords or hustlers but by those who think, create, and adapt with clarity.
In the end, the central question remains: Can a country outgrow its teachers? Or will the neglect of those shaping its future prove to be its greatest undoing?
Nigeria does not just need more teachers. It needs transformers: educators who can rebuild what is broken, reimagine what is possible, and reignite what has gone cold.
But until we start listening to those in the trenches, the rebuild Opeifa speaks of will remain a distant dream.