THE CHALLENGES OF DISTANCE EDUCATION IN NIGERIA

Bolupe Awe, Ph.D

School of Education,
National Open University of Nigeria,
14/16 Ahmadu Bello Way, Victoria Island, Lagos
E-mail address dr_abayomi36@yahoo.com
08034505947; 08083969736

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Introduction

Distance education is a field of education that focuses on teaching methods and technology with the

aim of delivering teaching, often on an individual basis, to students who are not physically present in a

traditional setting such as a classroom. In Nigeria, the emergence of distance education dates back to

external examinations organised by Universities of London, Cambridge and Oxford, which provided

opportunities for Nigerians wishing to acquire western education. Although these universities allowed

Nigerians to take examinations, none of them provided tuition to prepare students for its examinations.

Therefore, the need to fill the gap created due to lack of tuition led to the patronage of

correspondence institutions abroad by Nigerians. Thus, early Nigerian graduates went through the

University of London correspondence institution examinations. During this period, other Nigerians

took advantage of correspondence courses offered by British institutions such as Rapid Results

College and Wosley Hall to acquire their general certificate in education which was a prerequisite for

admission into university.

The first official recognition of distance education by the Nigerian government came in 1959

when as a prelude towards independence; the Federal Ministry of Education inaugurated the Ashby

Commission. The Ashby Report submitted in 1960, recommended the establishment of University of

Lagos with a department for correspondence courses. Later on, some universities such as University

of Ibadan and Ahmadu Bello University were providing extension services to their catchment areas.

The Ahmadu Bello University Institute of Education also introduced the Teacher In –Service

Education Programme to raise the quantity and quality of teachers in Northern Nigeria. According to

Adegbite and Oyekanmi (2010), the University of Ibadan also inaugurated distance education in 1988

in an attempt to meet the needs of the ever increasing applicants for university education through

distance learning programme.

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 When the National Council of Education ruled that the National Certificate of Education

(NCE) should be the minimum qualification for teaching at primary school level, the Ahmadu Bello

University Institute of Education, started the NCE by correspondence programme. The launching of

the Universal Primary Education in 1976 led to further recognition of the distance learning mode as a

veritable means of promoting teacher education. Towards this end, National Teachers Institute (NTI)

was established by the Federal Government in 1976 as the first institution providing distance

education courses designed to upgrade under-qualified and unqualified teachers.

An attempt to establish an Open University in Abuja was truncated and was replaced with a

dual-mode institution established as the University of Abuja. At the University of Abuja, the Centre

for Distance Learning and Continuing Education (CDLCE) was set up and mandated to provide

distance education component of every programme that the University would provide. However, the

strong commitment of the Federal Government to distance education led to the establishment of the

National Open University of Nigeria (NOUN) in 2002.

As of today, the National Universities Commission has approved the following universities as

dual mode institutions; namely: University of Ibadan, University of Lagos, University of Abuja,

Obafemi Awolowo University, University of Maiduguri and Federal University of Technology, Yola.

The dual mode institutions combine both the conventional and distance education programmes. In

some of these institutions students come for residential programmes when the regular students are on

vacation. Only the National Open University of Nigeria is the only uni-mode University in Nigeria.

The National Teachers Institute is another type dedicated to distance learning in Nigeria.

From the foregoing, it can be inferred that from an uncoordinated beginning, distance

education has become fully integrated into the Nigerian higher education system. It is in the

light of the foregoing that this paper will examine the rationale for distance education in Nigeria

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as well as the possible constraints against its sustainable development.

Rationale for distance education

The quest for western education by Nigerians during the colonial dispensation encouraged

education through correspondence. This was due to the negative attitude of the colonial

administration towards the education of its colonies. For instance, Hamza (1992) observed that

the colonial masters were interested in creating structures that facilitated exploitation of their

resources and suppress any revolt. Therefore, the initiative for developing the educational system

in Nigeria was left in the hand of the missionaries as well as ambitious individuals.

However, shortages in critical areas of manpower demand, the need to meet unsatisfied

demand for higher education as well ability to acquire further education while on the job make

distance education imperative in Nigeria today. The Commonwealth of Learning International

(2001) identified four major reasons for strong and growing institutional commitment to distance

education in Nigeria as follows:

• Institutions see potential for it to expand their reach and scale of operations.

• They regard distance education programmes as a strategy to absorb large number of students

who cannot currently be placed in face-to-face programmes.

• They see it as a means to provide education to working students.

• They see it as an opportunity to generate income.

The revised National Policy on Education (2004) articulated the goals of open and distance

education as to:

• Provide access to quality education and equity in educational opportunities for those who

otherwise would have been denied.

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 • Meet special needs of employers by mounting special certificate courses for their employees

at their work place.

• Encourage internationalization especially tertiary education curricula

• Ameliorate the effect of internal and external brain drain in tertiary institutions by utilizing

experts as teachers regardless of their locations or places of work, (p. 45).

The demand for university education and on the job training remains unabated in Nigeria.

According to Aderinoye (2002) the imperativeness of distance open education could be rested on its

ability “to provide dual mode learning processes that will take care of the educational needs of those

that are qualified for university education but could not be accommodated for lack of space in the

existing tertiary institutions.” Available information on unsatisfied demand for university education in

Nigeria is illustrated in Table 1.

The desire of this category of students that are locked out of universities, despite the possession

of minimum entry requirements can only be realized through open and distance education. This is

because the issue of carrying capacity is alien to open and distance education. With deployment of

modern technology, it is possible for a single open and distance learning university to absorb all

students currently enrolled in all Nigerian universities as well as those that are denied admission

because of lack of space.

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Table 1: Demand and Supply of University Education in Nigeria (1999/2000 – 2008/2009)

Year Number of Number

of Percentage Percentage of

applicants admitted admitted Unsatisfied demand

1999/2000 417,773 78,550 18.8 81.2

2000/2001 467,490 50,277 10.7 89.3

2001/2002 550,399 60,718 11.0 89

2002/2003 994,380 51,845 5.2 94.8

2003/2004 1,046,950 105,157 10 90

2004/2005 841,878 122,492 14.5 85.5

2005/2006 916,371 NA - -

2006/2007 803,472 123,626 15.3 84.7

2007/2008 1,054,053 194,521 18.5 81.5

2008/2009 1,182,381 NA NA

Source: Joint Admissions and Matriculations Board

A remarkable number of distance learning universities have several hundred thousand of

students on their rolls. Such universities include Anadolu Universitiesi in Turkey that caters for

577,000 students, the Radio and Television University in China has an enrolment figure of more than

500,000 students. According to Keegan (1994) there are in fact 350,000 students in Terbuka

University in Indonesia. Indira Gandhi National Open University has 500,000 on enrolment;

Sukkothai Thammatirat Open University in Thailand has 216,000 students and Korea National Open

University has 210,000 students. All these are single mode institutions (Peters, 2003). The National

Open University of Nigeria has 135,000 students on its roll (Tenebe, 2013). The huge enrolment

capacity of open and distance universities, justifies the need for their establishment as it provides a

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feasible solution to the problem of access currently faced by Nigerian students.

However, unlike in other countries where distance education is used to address the problem of

access to higher education, that of Nigeria remains a paradox. This is because the same criteria for

admission into conventional universities are used for admission into distance education institutions.

Thus distance education in Nigeria cannot be said to have fully addressed the issue of access. Some of

the challenges to distance education in Nigeria will form the basis of discussion in the next section.

Challenges of Distance Education in Nigeria

The official recognition given to distance education in Nigeria by the Federal Government is a clear

indication that distance education is fully blended with the conventional system of education,

particularly at the university level. However, challenges of distance education could be more daunting

than the conventional system, based on its peculiarities. Some of these challenges would now be

examined in the next section.

Societal recognition: The prevailing situation in the Nigerian educational system seems to

indicate that all is not well with the system. At the university level, the NUC (2005) observed

that glaring evidence of possible rot in the universities includes the complaints from the labour

market on the poor quality of graduates who have to be exposed to another period of in-house

training by their employers to make up for the deficiency in their skills. If conventional

universities are facing these challenges, then it is not unlikely that distance learning institutions

will face similar criticisms. It must be realized that distance education is an innovation that is

going to be accepted with caution by a society that has some reservations about the conventional

university system. This is because there is the fear that the “mechanization” of education could

bring down the standard. It is only when the society embraces distance education that the

certificate issued from such institutions will have recognition.

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Funding: The issue of funding continues to dominate discussions on challenges facing Nigerian

universities. The NUC (2006) reported that 30% of state universities were starved of funds with

acute shortage of grants for payment of staff salaries thus compelling the authorities to augment

through revenue sources that are unhealthy for the academic life of the institutions. Aina (2007)

observed that inadequate funding of universities has, no doubt, had calamitous effect on

teaching and research; and universities have been forced to embark on income generating

projects in order to source for funds.

Distance education is technology-driven and as such distance education is resources-

intensive. According to Adegbile and Oyekanmi (2010) sufficient fund must be provided by the

institution running the programme to make it result oriented. Sufficient money and time must be

allocated for adequate provision of such facilities the learners need, so that, course delivery

through the most appropriate technological means, as allowed by time and location could be

effective (Porter, 1991).

Distance education institutions can be categorized under specialized institutions that are

given special attention in view of their capital intensive nature. However, it has been found not

to be so in Nigeria. For instance, specialised universities in Nigeria are not accorded preferential

recognition over conventional universities; a development that leads to emergence of

homogenous institutions (Saint, Harnett and Strassner, 2003). Thus, open and distance

institutions in Nigeria are not insulated from the precarious funding challenges confronting the

conventional universities.

According to NOUN News Bulletin (2012), the amount appropriated to the National Open

University of Nigeria in 2011 was N497, 800, 000 while the amount actually released was N337,

000,000 leaving a balance of N160, 000,000; meaning that only 67.7% percent of the

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appropriated fund was released. In 2012, the amount appropriated was N411, 000, out of which

N115, 000,000 was released towards the end of May of the same year leaving an outstanding

sum of N296,000,000 meaning that only 23% of the amount appropriated was provided ( NOUN

News Bulletin). This erratic funding patterns no doubt constrain the functions of this distance

learning university.

Quality assurance of academic programmes: One of the problems often harped upon by critics

of distance education is the propensity of the system to malpractices in homework assignments,

tests and examinations, (Ojo, 1983). Examination malpractices have become a bane of Nigerian

universities. NUC (2006) reported a slight lowering of reported cases relative to its scope of

manifestation in 2004 but noted that there should not be any room for complacency as the level

of examination malpractice involving staff and students was still intolerably high. Sustained

efforts were required for the level to taper to zero.

Nigerian universities have inbuilt mechanisms for quality assurance. In addition, the

NUC published the Minimum Academic Standard (MAS) Documents that provide benchmark

for the evaluation of Nigerian universities. The MAS documents stipulate a curriculum as well as

the minimum entry and graduation requirements for each discipline. The criteria for accreditation

and the mode of ranking of Nigerian universities based on the MAS Documents are stated thus:

academic content 23; staffing 32; physical facilities 25; library 12; funding 5 and employees

rating of graduates 3, The Document also indicated that to earn full accreditation, a programme

must score 70% and above in addition to scoring at least 70% in each of the core areas of

staffing, academic content, physical facilities and library. Since the same criteria are used for the

evaluation of Nigerian universities irrespective of type, the task of surmounting accreditation

hurdle becomes a big challenge to distance education institutions.

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Management of Open and Distance Learning Institutions: With the increasing number of

potential university students, the shortage of financial resources and the necessity for redefinition

of the contents, distribution and method of delivery of academic programmes, it becomes

imperative for the management of distance education institutions in Nigeria to adopt management

strategies that will ensure sustainable development of distance education. The observed

inadequacies of prudential management within the university system informed the convening of

the National Summit on Higher Education by the Federal Ministry of Education in 2012. The

Summit resolved that:

• All new entrants into management of higher educational institutions should be exposed to

an appropriate senior management training programme in order to enhance efficiency.

• An effective Committee system of management should be established where the system

does not exist and strengthened where it currently does (Federal Ministry of Education,

(p5).

When the foregoing is considered along with the peculiarities of distance education in Nigeria,

its management can be daunting. This is because the wholesale transfer of management

techniques that work in a conventional university system might bring about dysfunction in

distance education institutions. This scenario implies that those that are in charge of the

management of distance institutions in Nigeria must be well grounded in the management

principles that can function in distance learning institutions. This poses serious challenges,

because as of now most pioneer staff of distance education institutions in Nigeria are drawn from

the conventional system. After all, one of the justifications for the establishment of a unimode

distance learning institution is that the administrative structures of conventional educational

systems are not the most suitable ones for developing and managing open and distance learning

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systems (Commonwealth of Learning and Asian Development Bank, 1999).

Instructional Delivery Method: Distance learning has brought about educational paradigm shift

that will continue due to the tremendous impact of the great number of advances in information

and communication technologies. There is a great difference between distance learning and

traditional type in which students listen to lecturers, read their textbooks and are busy with

memorizing and recalling selected topics.

In distance learning, since students do not have unlimited access to lecturers as in

conventional tertiary institutions, instructional materials must be packaged to facilitate self-study

and easy comprehension by the learners without much assistance from their facilitators. Rhaman

(2006) observed that traditional texts provide the subject matter without considering the reader’s

ability to learn by themselves. This is where the text of distance learning differs. Therefore, it is

considered significant to understand the basic difference between a textbook normally used in

conventional educational system and self-study instructional materials used in open and distance

learning system of education.

In the view of Rowntree (1986), self-instructional materials must carry out all the

functions a teacher would carry out in the conventional system. Lockwook (1997) in his

comparative study between traditional textbook and self-instructional materials indicated that

while textbooks assume interest, self-instructional materials arouse interest. He added further

that textbooks are written for teacher use while instructional materials are written for learners’

use. Therefore, it is important that specialists in instructional design and instructional materials

developments must be available in order to develop interactive instructional materials that are

crucial to the success of distance education.

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Distance Education Technologies: Advancement in technology has continued to transform distance

education globally. Starting from correspondence model of distance education where the main

instructional medium was print, to the development of synchronous (two-way, real time interactive

technologies) such as audio teleconferencing, audio graphics conferencing and video conferencing, it

is now possible to link learners and instructors who are geographically separated for real time

interaction (McIsaac and Gunawardena, 2004). In addition, the asynchronous feature of computer-

mediated communications on the other hand has been associated with the ability to accommodate time

schedules of distance learners.

Further development in technology has led to a move towards multi-media system integrating

a combination of technologies from the use of print as a major delivery medium which characterized

most of distance education institutions in the 1970’s and 1980’s. McIsaac and Gunawardena, (2004)

selected “The 4-Square Map of Groupware Options” as the most appropriate model to describe the

technologies used in distance education. According to them, this model was selected based on their

perception that distance education is moving from highly individualized forms of instruction as in

correspondence education, to formats that encourage teaching students as a group and collaborative

learning peers.

Distance education is technology-driven, therefore in a developing nation like Nigeria absence

of necessary infrastructure for technological development, poses a threat to distance education. For

instance, it has been observed that rapid increases in the number and variety of educational products

(e.g. hardware and software) and new educational technologies: technical tools and services change so

rapidly that the traditionally slow organizational processes of universities find it hard to keep up. The

hardware and software solutions available are changing and proliferating so fast that the universities

cannot hope to fund purchases of the latest products (Reid, 1999). This is particularly problematic for

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institutions in developing nations, not only in terms of providing the technology and infrastructure for

management, development and delivery within the institutions but for the all-important outreach and

student support services in disadvantaged or remote areas. An assessment conducted in August 1999

of the available resources for delivering distance education at the Centre for Distance Learning and

Continuing Education at the University of Abuja indicated that available facilities are inadequate for

both present and future needs (Moja, 2000).

A study by Nigerian Information Technology Professionals in America in 2002 indicated that

given current ICT penetration, it may take Nigeria 50 years to catch up with America on the aspect of

personal computer count per households (Iromanto, 2004). Olulube, Ubogu and Egbezor (2007)

reported that a study conducted by the Global Information Technology used the Networked Readiness

Index (NRI), covering a total of 115 economies in 2005-2006, to measure the degree of preparation of

a nation or community to participate in and benefit from ICT developments ranked Nigeria 90th out of

the 115 countries surveyed. Similarly, Yusuf (2005) observed that in Nigeria, like most African

countries basic ICT infrastructures are inadequate. In a study conducted by Awe (2012), it was

reported that students identified inadequate ICT facilities and ICT support staff as barriers to distance

learning. Thus it can be inferred that lack of technology is a very big problem to distance education

institutions in Nigeria.

Conclusion and recommendations

The foregoing indicates that challenges of distance education in Nigeria are multifaceted and dynamic

in nature. In addition, these challenges are interwoven and revolve around technology. The solutions

to these challenges require strategic planning for sustainable development of distance learning. Based

on the foregoing, the following recommendations are made:

1. The precarious financial status demands adequate provision of fund from government while

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 management of ODL institutions must improve on their internally generated revenue base in

order to acquire necessary technology and other infrastructure required for efficient

instructional delivery.

2. There is the need for massive investment in technological infrastructure in Nigeria in order to

catch up with ODL global revolution.

3. Institutions that operate dual mode system must be well monitored to ensure that funds

generated through ODL programmes are ploughed back into the unit. Through this method

funds that are meant for ODL will not be used to service the conventional mode of learning.

4. Training and retraining programmes of staff must be a regular feature of ODL institutions due

to their technological demand as well as the dynamic nature which renders new technology

obsolete within a short period.

5. Nigerians must be exposed to fundamentals of computer literacy and Internet usage. This is to

avoid the stress that students, without basic understanding of computer, will pass through

when using ICT.

6. There is the need for the development of a core of instructional design experts that would

identify learners’ needs and goals and create some learning materials for the overall

realization of these goals.

7. There must be synergy among distance learning institutions in Nigeria to ensure quality

service delivery.

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