Governor AbdulRahman AbdulRazaq has once again shown that he is interested in ensuring a secured future for public school students in the state.
The governor launched schools rehabilitation project in Ilorin, the state capital, penultimate Thursday. It according to him signaled the beginning of a new era for the education sector in the state. In the ambit of the project, 31 public schools are expected to be rehabilitated across the state.
The exercise was formally launched at the Baboko Community Secondary School, Ilorin, where three blocks of six classrooms are to be fully rehabilitated and fixed with modern information communication facilities.
The completion period for the rehabilitation of the Baboko Community Secondary School project is six weeks’ time.
The governor said the 31 schools are the first phase of the rehabilitation project which will gradually guarantee decent learning environment for the students.
Governor AbdulRazaq had about one hour earlier supervised the distribution of 932,572 free copies of customized 20, 40 and 80 leaves of exercise books for public school students in the state.
While speaking at the event, the governor disclosed that he has approved the payment of N30.5m penalties imposed on some schools in the state for exam malpractices at the last year secondary school leaving examination.
‘The lack of conducive learning environment and longstanding failure to properly fund education — we last accessed UBEC fund in 2013 — can explain rampant incidents of examination malpractices. We are working to end this menace and return Kwara to the top of the table in the north central and beyond’ he said.
The state government will according to him hold an education summit soon to bring together all the stakeholders and private sector players to discuss the challenges and suggest workable solutions.
Commissioner for Education, Hajia Fatimah Ahmed who commended the governor for his giant strides in the education sector, also chronicled his achievements which according to her includes ; the establishment of an ICT centre at the School for Special Needs, provision of N5m worth of teaching aids and other basic equipment at same school, settling outstanding arrears of N55m feeding allowance of the exchange students inherited from the past administration, sponsoring the 2019 common entrance, and the recent approval of routine training for teachers in the state.
Other stakeholders in the education sector also commended the governor for his determined efforts to bring sanity and standards to the sector
