NTI to coordinate FG’s six-month programme to professionalise 250,000 teachers

The National Teachers’ Institute (NTI), Kaduna, has been mandated to coordinate a federal government initiative aimed at professionalising 250,000 serving teachers without professional qualifications.

The Accelerated Teacher Professionalisation Pathway (ATPP), initiated by Tunji Alausa, minister of education, is designed to bridge qualification gaps among teachers and strengthen professional standards in Nigeria’s basic education system.

Sadiya Sani Daura, director and chief executive of NTI, will lead the institute in coordinating the programme under the supervision of the federal ministry of education.

The initiative is targeted at teachers who are already in classrooms but lack professional teaching qualifications.

A significant number of such teachers are also not licensed by the Teachers Registration Council of Nigeria (TRCN), making them difficult to bring under the professional standards enforced by the council.

Rather than removing the affected teachers from classrooms, the ATPP is designed to provide them with a structured route to obtain professional qualifications while continuing to teach.

The programme will be delivered through two blended routes: the postgraduate diploma in education (PGDE) for serving teachers with degrees in non-education disciplines and the professional diploma in education (PDE) for serving teachers entering from the national diploma cadre.

Both routes will combine self-paced digital content, virtual sessions, structured assessment checkpoints and supervised teaching practice.

The teaching practice will be verified in the teachers’ own schools rather than through simulated off-site centres.

NTI will serve as the coordinating secretariat and will work with the Universal Basic Education Commission (UBEC), TRCN, Nigerian Educational Research and Development Council (NERDC), National Senior Secondary Education Commission (NSSEC), National Universities Commission (NUC) and other relevant institutions.

The institute will coordinate curriculum, content management and quality assurance of programme deliverables in collaboration with UBEC and the steering committee.

The ATPP is a six-month programme comprising four months of intensive instruction and two months of teaching practice.

The teaching practice component is designed around a structured practicum, mentor and supervisor protocols, and documented evidence of lessons taught, pupils’ work and supervisor signoffs.

The records will be maintained against each candidate’s programme profile to provide evidence of practical teaching competence.

According to the programme design, the approach is blended by necessity, combining virtual and physical components to ensure that teachers do not progress solely on the strength of digital learning.

In preparation for the programme’s take-off, the academic component has substantially been completed.

The curriculum frameworks for the PGDE and PDE routes have been reviewed, validated and finalised, while module development was undertaken by a national panel of about 40 content experts drawn from universities, colleges of education and mandate agencies, including NTI, TRCN, NSSEC, UBEC and NERDC.

The programme architecture has also been mapped across the federal, state and local government levels.

The remaining work covers the digital curriculum delivery process, teaching practice component and engagement with partner institutions.

The federal government said the initiative was conceived under President Bola Tinubu’s Renewed Hope Agenda to address structural weaknesses in Nigeria’s basic education system by providing a credible, affordable and time-bound route for serving teachers to acquire professional qualifications recognised by TRCN.

The media communication strategy for the programme was considered by the sub-committee on media and communication, headed by Iyela Ajayi, executive secretary of NSSEC.

Yusha’u Ahmed, head of public relations and protocol at NTI, represented the institute at the committee’s deliberations.

The ATPP is expected to be launched in October 2026.