62,000 graduates jostle for 7,600 teaching jobs in Kaduna

A total of 62,000 applicants on Saturday sat for aptitude and qualifying test to teach in secondary schools across the 23 local government areas of Kaduna state.

The state Commisioner for Education, Science and Technology, Alhaji Ja’faru Sani said in a statement that “out of the number, the State Government will recruit only 7,600 qualified teachers that will teach in the state’s public secondary schools.

Giving the breakdown, he said “about 31,000 HND, B.sc, Master’s Degree and Ph.D. holders were participating in the first phase of the aptitude test.”

His words: “more than 31,000 holders of NCE would write their examination in a later date.”

According to him, “the measure is to ensure effective supervision with a view to getting the best to teach in secondary schools.

“You will recall that about two months ago, we placed advertisement seeking for qualified candidates to apply for teaching positions in our secondary schools.

“Today in this centre and many other centres across the state, the applicants were writing the aptitude test to be considered for the teaching positions.

“We had to do the screening in phases because we earlier envisaged a manageable number but ended up with more than 60,000 applicants seeking to join the teaching service of the state government.

“Because of logistics and the need to have a conducive environment for the examination, we decided to stagger the screening exercise, starting with over 30,000 HND, B.Ed., B.sc, Masters and Ph.D holders.

“The over 31,000 NCE holders will be invited for the examination at no distant time.”

Sani added that “the recruitment was part of the current administration’s efforts to address the problem of teacher quality in public schools.”

He said that the goal of the current administration was to achieve better education service delivery for all by 2030