Nigerian education is not as appalling as often portrayed

A lot of us have always argued that university education in Nigeria is inferior in all its ramifications. I do not seem to agree with such sweeping statements in its entirety. I have always criticised Nigerian universities as regards postgraduate education and research aimed to explore and synthesise new knowledge. So, while I will continue to criticise our universities and advise all Nigerians to go to other countries for postgraduate education if they have the opportunity, nonetheless, I feel differently about the quality of undergraduate education in our universities. Nigerian universities are certainly not world class from a general perspective, but I believe that in many instances, they are capable of producing world class knowledge at the undergraduate level.

I will demonstrate what I mean with several personal examples. I attended the University of Maiduguri for a geology undergraduate degree. What I was taught in Maiduguri is what they teach geology students in all universities in the most advanced countries. Today I have a terminal degree. And the degree was only possible because I used my geology knowledge to earn it from a supposedly world class institution. During my doctoral study, there was no time that my supervisors and/or peer reviewers thought that I did not have a sufficient understanding of geology to allow me conduct advanced level scientific research. It is well known that Cranfield University, where I studied, is not even a geology institution and to the best of my knowledge, I was the only geology researcher in that institution. In fact, my understanding of geology was intact that I never needed a supervisor with that expertise (and even if I needed one, there was no geology professor in Cranfield University). My supervisor was a chemist by training and he admitted that supervising me had taught him a lot geology. One day, I even met him boasting to his colleague (another chemistry professor) that the other professor could not tell him what ‘saline aquifers’ were, but that he knew saline aquifers because he was supervising me and learning a lot of geology. The postdoc with whom I worked also thanked me for availing him the opportunity to learn geology by introducing him into my research. And all of that knowledge was earned in Maiduguri.

During my time in the UK, I was also privileged to serve as specialist examiner for AS/A levels geology for the Oxford, Cambridge and Royal Society of Arts (OCR). There were five of us who marked OCR geology examinations in the UK at that time. Prior to the beginning of marking, standardisation meetings were held. The process was to ensure that examinations were marked fairly and consistently, and it also puts to test the knowledge and skills of the examiner on the subject they were to mark. All the five of us in the room were geologists as the qualification for marking required a degree in the subject. Three of them had their degrees before I was born (one of them told me he graduated more than fifty years ago and wondered if I saw him as being too old!). Two were retired geologists; one amongst them worked for the defunct National Coal Board. One was an active geology teacher. And the principal examiner who was the head of the team had doctoral training from a UK university, worked in the Australian mining sector for some time, and was at the time teaching geology in the Isle of Man. They were all very experienced and highly knowledgeable of the subject. I was the least experienced in the room. But I had no problems being in their midst and passing the standardisation tests so that I was allowed to mark. During the process of standardisation, we debated technical and scientific concepts and there was no time I either felt or they (the rest of the team) felt that I had some below par understanding of the discipline. They were all Britons with world class British degrees. At the end of the standardisation meeting, the principal examiner even told me she hoped that I would be available to continue working for them in the subsequent years.

Now, someone will argue that if I had had my undergraduate geology education from a UK university, no matter what, I would have been more exposed to the content of the geology curriculum than I was while studying in Maiduguri. But that argument may be problematic as there are no two-degree programs that are the same in terms of content and methods of delivery. For example, if you study veterinary medicine in Maiduguri and another person studies the same subject in Nsukka, there are chances that the Nsukka graduate would have been exposed to some knowledge on piggery while the Maiduguri graduate may fall short on that. Would that then amount to saying that the Nsukka programme is better than the Maiduguri programme sensu lato? The same applies to universities in the developed countries. Studying an undergraduate petroleum geology course in the UK, for example, will expose a student to references on producing fields in the North Sea while the student taking the same subject in Nigeria is exposed to references on producing fields in the Niger Delta.

A friend from Nigeria whom I met in the UK told me that he had his first master’s degree in offshore and ocean technology with pipeline engineering in a supposedly world class UK university. But according to him, the module on pipeline design was poorly delivered, and the students were not taken for any field work or hands-on experience on subsea installation. He wondered how his Nigerian colleagues will believe him if he tells them that he completed an advanced engineering degree from a UK university even though he never saw the necessary subsea equipment? While this may not be the case in another UK university; however, the reality suggests that the differences in delivery and organisation are rife even between universities found in the same (developed) country.

I believe that there are universities in Nigeria that are capable of delivering a world class undergraduate education and it is the reason that some graduates from Nigerian universities compete with graduates of world class institutions for scholarships such as the Chevening Awards, and they are successful. How could they have succeeded in world class competitions if they had no world class knowledge gained from Nigerian universities? Doctors who obtained their undergraduate training in Nigeria take international examinations to allow them practice medicine in Euro-America. How could they have passed those examinations if they had a below par knowledge of their disciplines?

Lastly, some people claim that the success of Nigerians (such as the case of Nigerian-trained doctors passing the United States Medical Licensing Examination) is only possible because we (Nigerians) were wired to succeed by putting in an extraordinary effort in what we do. But such a claim is problematic as all success in the world (whether in Nigeria or not) requires extraordinary effort. Success requires going the extra mile to achieve distinction. It is therefore important to state that all universities in the world can only give you a foundation to build upon. It makes no sense to say that a Nigerian trained graduate could not have been successful if they had not added their individual effort. Will a Briton or an American also succeed without their own individual effort? Having the individual effort is precisely what is needed for success irrespective of the school or country you studied in. So, the fact that Nigerians often add their own effort on the foundation they got from their trainings in Nigerian schools which allowed them to be confident everywhere in the world is enough indication that the education they received is not as appalling as is portrayed. In a general sense, we have issues here and there as a system, but when you talk about the actual education received, many undergraduate trained Nigerians can compete favourably with their peers from around the world.