Only 150 schools can deliver online learning in Lagos-Commissioner

Olabisi Deji-Folutile

Lagos State Commissioner for Education, Mrs Folasade Adefisayo, has revealed that only about 150 schools out of all the public and private schools in the state can deliver proper online education.

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Presently, Lagos State has over 600,000 junior and secondary schools and more than 18,000 private schools.

According to Adefisayo, many of the schools claiming to offer online education are not providing proper online learning.

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She told participants at the zoom meeting organised by the Concerned Parents and Educators Initiative (CPE) tagged “Facing the reality of the new normal in the education sector,” that what most schools referred to as online learning, was very shallow.

She said, “In many cases, the pupils are smarter than their teachers. What is being offered is very shallow, but parents want the totality of online learning.” She gave the example of a particular case where students that were supposed to be learning online logged off their teacher and switched to a pornography site.

The CPE under its founder, Mrs Yinka Ogunde, had brought together all commissioners of education in the South West namely Lagos, Ogun, Osun, Ekiti, Oyo and Ondo States to discuss sundry issues affecting education as schools remain closed due to COVID-19 pandemic.

The Commissioner explained that there was need to build the capacity of teachers in the delivery of online learning in the country, adding that less than five per cent of the student population in Lagos had access to devices such as laptops and phones required for online learning.

She advised private schools that are unable to offer proper online teaching to collaborate with schools, especially in other West African countries, in the area of content sharing, which she said, could be free.