By Muhammed Mustapha Jagne,
a National Teacher Award Winner 2024
The World Teachers Day is meant to recognise the outstanding roles teachers play in the field of education. As this year’s theme hinges on VALUING Teacher voices: towards a new social contract for education, let us remind ourselves on the pressing issues affecting educators and our education system for the greater good of the future.
The education sector is grappling with challenges that which can hinder the growth of quality education in the country and issues surrounding those challenges is well known and comprehended. If we do not value the significant roles teachers are playing in the country, then it will be difficult to transcend our education system to a level we are all expecting.
This year’s Theme clearly Manifest to us that, Teachers voice matters and this, I am connecting it to the condition of service: better wages in settling our bills, cater for family needs and improving our living conditions. Valuing the voice of Teachers shows whether we are fair to the education system or not. Teachers are the umbrella body of education and should not be exploited at an expense of the masses. The system is regarded as exploitative because your monthly earning does not tally with the service you are offering in the education sector.
The new social contract in education clearly depicts an agreement in the sector of education regarding the need for improvement in terms of wages and salaries of teachers and an establish connection between educators and relevant stakeholders in education for the development of our education system.
Let us remind ourselves that teachers play a key role in impacting lives, exposing hidden talents and saving the narratives of the future with a great deal of passion, signifying a slogan called “PEOPLE HELPING PEOPLE TO GROW”.
WE help people grow and struggle with our own, that shows that we are not selfish but we can’t continue rough raging in our take-home which is small and expect us to be in good shape in the teaching field. An effective service delivery deserves a massive reward.
We must invest on educators and education, if we want to see an overall positive educational outcome. Where there is motivation, expect good result but where there is no motivation, expect anything unexpected.
Let’s give credit to where it belongs and stop pronouncing our profession as a noble profession while we continue suffering from poor living conditions. Isn’t this enough to see us being expose to the outside environment as a low paid profession where everyone strapped a sign of disrespect to our profession and never take us seriously.
Today, we have ample teachers leaving the field of education because of the lack of teacher motivation and retention. Both qualified and graduate teachers got lost and went to join other sectors of work so they can transcend and live a better life. Couldn’t we find solutions to this unspeakable problem and think of the way forward.
Value our voices and never take us for granted for we are unlike common people and our profession involves risk bearing and those posted to the border territories knows what I am talking about.
Belittle us, but we are propelling the belittlement and can never allow it to ravage us. And as teachers, we are proud of impacting lives but not proud of our condition of service that does not come along with a massive reward we are in dire need of.
In addition, the teacher service commission should be included in the draft constitution. It’s unfair to see other sectors of work favoring themselves by taking advantage over us. The judiciary and the legislative organ of government taking a favor and wants our profession to continue being exploitative. We need the teacher service commission and we can’t afford to see ourselves being paid by the service commission and not the integrated pay scale.
In conclusion, let’s keep valuing the voice of Teachers: for a new social contract in education for the betterment of our education system. This year’s theme highlights on the challenges face by teachers and how to mitigate those challenges for the betterment of the profession. Thank you all.
