By Ayodele Oni
Parents of pupils in private primary and secondary schools in Ondo state have cried out to Governor Rotimi Akeredolu to bail them out from greedy Ministry officials, Proprietors and Book Publishers.
One of the parents, Segun Odidi, in a letter to the Governor exposed how Proprietors and Ministry of Education officials collude with Publishers to milk parents of their hard earned money.
In the letter, Odidi claimed that they do this through changing of school curriculum every session which leads to change of textbooks randomly.
“Sir, it becomes imperative to bring to your notice urgently through this means the unwholesome practice of School owners and publishers under the supervision of Ministry of Education.
“Your Excellency, you will recall with nostalgia when people of your generation were growing up during our primary and secondary school days, the Ministry of Education always set curriculum for the primary and post primary schools, regulating their activities vis a vis the teaching mode, and most especially books to be bought by parents for the pupils/ Students.
“Once a parent bought text books for their children, those children coming behind will also have the opportunity to make use of the same thereby reducing the burden on parents buying different books every term or session as the case may be.
“The practice now is so arbitrary, bad and place unnecessary financial burdens on the parents, a situation where a child cannot inherit text books from his elder brother.
“What happens to the previous practice where curriculum is constant and gives room for younger ones to make use of the textbooks earlier used by the elderly ones?.
“What is the interest of the Proprietors of Schools and the Ministry of Education,the supervisory body?
“Why are they changing curriculum each passing session to the extent that those very good old practice that reduces burden on parents has been discarded?
“We want you to call the Ministry of Education, schools and publishers to order, the idea of changing curriculum, changing textbooks every session/ term is not acceptable.
“Let the curriculum be constant, let’s reduce the stress and financial burden on parents, let’s go back to the old practice where younger child can make use of the books used by the elder brother when he gets to the particular class or level.
“We plead with you to use your good office to cause an Education summit to take place in the State and I can assure you, the pulse of the parents/ Guardian will be felt.”
However in reaction, the Commissioner for Education, Mr Femi Agagu, stated that the practice was strange to him.
“This is very strange to me. I learnt there was something like that before I became Commissioner and we have since stopped it. At least, I have not approved any change since IÂ came on board.
“If anybody is doing it, then it will be illegal. I have asked for investigation on the matter. We even stopped Principals who were helping Publishers to sell books and insisted that parents should buy books from bookshops of their choice.”
