Kaduna -Dr. Masa’udu Kazaure, the Executive Secretary, National Board for Technical Education (NBTE) on Wednesday enjoined the Rectors of Nigerian polytechnics to key into Federal Government’s policy of zero tolerance for corruption.
Kazaure said this in Kaduna at a one-day workshop on carrying capacity for rectors of polytechnics in the country.
He said that all institutions and the NBTE needed to imbibe the culture of zero tolerance to corruption for the country to move forward.
The executive secretary observed that polytechnics were in the habit of lending lecturers and non-academic staff to fill up the missing gaps.
“This is not proper. The heads of various institutions should ensure zero tolerance to corruption of this nature.
“ Institutions must strictly adhere to the regulations guiding facilities and carrying capacity.
“There must be transparency, particularly in the provision of facilities by all institutions,” he said.
According to him, the essence of the workshop is to brainstorm on how best to expand access and equity in technical and vocational education in tune with international best practices.
“International best practices provided for 30 students per class in technical and vocational, and 40 for management based programmes, but some institutions are advocating for 70, some even 100.
“Based on this, we have to come together and look at international best practices, and how to make necessary adjustment without compromising quality,” he said.
The NBTE boss acknowledged that ‘carrying capacity’ was not easy to fully implement due to inadequacy of higher educational institutions in the country.
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He described ‘carrying capacity’ as“ admitting students into various programmes based on available facilities, such as adequate lecture rooms, well stocked libraries, convenient staff/student ratio, availability of laboratories and equipment, among others.”
“This policy is aimed at ensuring quality of instruction, as such institutions must not exceed their capacity if doing so will compromise basic minimum standard,” he added.
Kazaure said that there were currently 556 technical and vocational institutions under the purview of the NBTE.
“This number is grossly inadequate, considering the unprecedented level of demand for higher education in recent times, and the institutions can only accommodate a fraction of the youths seeking admission,” he said.(NAN)
