by Ayo-Oluwa Obafemi

Education to some of the lecturers is defined as “finishing the syllables” and not “impacting knowledge”.

Coming from a lineage of lecturers, I have a soft spot for these group of people and always rise to their defence through thick and thin even when valid points are raised against their actions knowing the volume of work they perform and the less than attractive conditions available to them. But, it’s with a pinch on my last nerve and the ensuing flow of blood that I set out to scribble this.

“Make sure you attend my lectures by 6pm or that’s it for you all”, the lecturer blared. Yeah, you saw that right, 6pm – 6 pee m.
We weren’t dazed being that this wasn’t the first time we were made to pass through such strain. The lecturer sometime ago had the effrontery to fix a lecture at almost this same time and made us stay around while he was navigating his way to the venue from a destination outside the state of the university’s location probably from a personal business.

The painful part was having to wait for close to two hours only for him to arrive in full glory, like a president making his way to a function with his convoy, only to tell us the lecture won’t be holding without any apologies and consequently taking attendance after many had gone home not able to endure the endless wait and as a result of suffering from an exhaustion of patience which was barely hanging onto a cliff prior to that moment. 7.30pm was when we checked out. And with  this  action  going unchecked,  another  was fixed  for  Valentine’s  eve  by  six  in  the evening.

This  is  a  lecture  for  which  we  spend  the  major  part  listening  to  the  lecturer’s autobiography. Let’s not go into the ethical fight on whether it’s right or wrong to fix a lecture late into the night or whether it’s right to keep females most especially those living outside the premises of the university  up till  that time or the damage that could be caused by studying with little or no illumination.

Education to some of the lecturers is defined as “finishing the syllabus” and not “impacting knowledge”.

The Machiavellian lifestyle of some of these lecturers is part of the reason the education system is so poor and has no clear plan of improving soonest. Universities  gloat  over  the  webometrics  ranking  and  brag  about  it  whenever  it  is  released forgetting  that  the  ranking has  nothing to  do  with  the  quality  of  students  produced  by  the institution.

Words fail me to describe, and I’ll never forget the lecturer who once gave a lecture for a new topic four days  to  exam and brought  it  out as  a  compulsory 40 marks question.  Unverified rumours filtered that the lecturer finished with a magna cum laude.

It’s no news that most are retained for their academic achievements rather than their teaching skills finding the scholarship by the school as an escape route to a faster higher degree pursuit.

They elevate consultancy services and promotion to the next cadre more important than their major work in the university– teaching. Some lecturers see the university institution as a kingdom where they can instill their autocratic hold on the students; victimising and extorting from them as they wish and even going ahead to give undeserved grades due to their carelessness and laxness forgetting that there’s a limit to their power and that it stops at the gate of the school.

The reason we bend to their will is because of the daily reminder that no employer cares to know the conditions under which we are meant to learn; for all they care only those with good grades are needed. Complaining and going on rampage for change as students is not the answer when the tune of a good CGPA constantly plays to our heads making everyone play safe; moving like a zombie awaiting the next instruction. As one lecturer said, we can’t expect change when we’re still going on with the same standard for years.

If we want to beat our counterparts abroad, a great overhaul is needed of the entire lecturing body. When impacting knowledge becomes the watchword for the lecturers, only then will things change for good.

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Ayo-Oluwa Obafemi tweets from @ayooluwa2009

 

Op-ed pieces and contributions are the opinions of the writers only and do not represent the opinions of Y!/YNaija.