With an average of over 100 students in a class in many of the public schools in Lagos, enrolment figures have gone burst. Infrastructure is overstretched; classrooms have become theatres of noise and confusion. EMMANUEL ONYECHE examines the undercurrents of how this trend came to be and how the perplexed and helpless teachers are straining to cope

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The ugly state of Lagos primary schools 2

AN announcement posted on a notice board in Lagos State Model College,

Meiran in the Agbado-Ijaiye Local Development Area listed the names of teachers that would countersign what the notice called the “dossiers” for two arms of the senior secondary school class. For the SSS One class, 13 arms –– A to M –– were listed and each arm, except SSS One L, was in duplicate. That is to say there were SSI AI, AII, BI, BII, CI, CII up to MI and MII.

The SSSII class also had 13 arms and, except for SSII D and SSII F, they were also in duplicates. The principal of the school would not speak on the enrolment figures, claiming she did not have the authority to do so as a civil servant. But several of the students and some teachers, who craved anonymity, did. One student said, “I am in JSSII B (a merger of BI and BII in one class) and we are 120.”

Another one said, “I am in SSIII A and we are 92.”

“There is no JSS or SSS class that is less than 10 arms or 90 students in one class,” a teacher said. “That is what the government wants and we have left it like that for them.”

Our correspondent, who went round the school, counted 108 students in one noisy JSS class, where a lesson was going on. Every inch of the large room was brimming with students. Chairs and tables meant for two students were shared by four. Some students were taking their notes while standing, and several others, especially those at the back, were in a world of their own, playing all sorts of pranks. The perplexed teacher, who stood in front of them, spent more time trying to gain their attention than in teaching.

“Many of the chairs and tables were bought by the parents of the students. But there are students whose parents have not provided chairs and tables. That is why you see some of them standing in the class,” another female teacher said. In some classes, the tables and chairs are so crammed together that there is no space left at all.

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