African Innovators in the education sector took center stage at the 2021 RewirEd summit, which took place at the Expo 2020 Dubai.

The summit, led by Dubai Cares, and delivered in partnership with global stakeholders; presented an opportunity for the global education community to gather as a collective to scale and jumpstart some of the positive change the sector wants to see in education.

The African Union presented to the world, gathered at Expo 2020 Dubai, this year’s finalists in the Innovating Education in Africa (IEA) challenge.

Five innovators, who made it to the finale, had the priviledge of pitching their ideas to a global audience.

The Innovating Education in Africa (IEA) is a flagship programme of the African Union Commission and Partners, intended to identify and promote practical social and technological innovations aimed at enhancing access, quality, relevance and inclusion in education in order to release the potential for empowerment, employability and inventiveness, as stipulated in the Continental Education Strategy for Africa (CESA 16-25).

Since its establishment in 2018, the IEA program has identified 140 innovations from over 40 African countries and invested up to 500,000 USD to promote and support their growth.

The Acting Head of the Education Division, Hambani Masheleni, highlighted the critical need for adopting innovations within Africa’s education systems and the need to ensure quality, relevance, and inclusion from the early years.

He underscored the importance of public-private partnerships to build and sustain ecosystems that support scaling of innovations and education outcomes, to drive Africa’s development agenda under Agenda 2063.

Out of the five finalists, three innovators were awarded grants that will be used to undertake pilot projects in collaboration with African Union Member States, to create reference points for scaling innovation in education and training.

Ghana’s Rudolf Ampopo, CEO of Craft Education, a teletherapy platform that allows African parents and teachers to help children with learning difficulties received a $100 000 reward and injection.

Democratic Republic Congo’ Elijah Lubala, Co-founder of SOLAR-FI, collected a $70 000 reward towards their project.

Samson W. Muwanguzi of Yiya Air Science, received $40 000 towards their innovation which provides remote learning via widely accessible technology.

Speaking of the innovators’ remarkable achievements, the AU’s Expo 2020 Deputy Commissioner General, Charles Chiumya, congratulated the winners, and all who participated throughout the challenge.

The Directorate of Education (DoE) says winter break for students up to class 5 at Delhi government schools will be from January 1 to 15 and no online or offline teaching-learning activity can be conducted during this period.

The winter break was supposed to begin from December 28 and continue till January 15, 2020.

According to an official order issued by the government, the syllabus of the academic session 2021-22 covered, so far, will be revised during the vacations through assignments. This is in a bid to help students consolidate their learning.

The DoE said that the assessment record of winter break assignments and activities must be maintained scrupulously and shall count towards internal assessment.

It said Class teachers may be further directed to make a note of the strengths and weaknesses of the students of their respective classes, so that individual attention may be given to each student after the winter vacation.

The National Universities Commission (NUC) has released a full list of all approved federal, state, and private universities in Nigeria.

The list shows Nigeria currently has 45 federal universities, 54 state universities and 99 private universities, making a total of 198.

In another report, the NUC published on its official website the list of federal, state and private universities that have the approval to operate Masters and PhD degree programmes.

The NUC expressed concern that some universities in the country are running unapproved postgraduate programmes.

Similarly, the NUC released the list of Nigerian universities that have the approval to operate distance learning centres.

Recall the commission in a bulletin published on Monday, September 20, had also stated that the National Open University of Nigeria (NOUN) which had 72 study/resource centres nationwide is currently the only approved Open University in Nigeria.

Meanwhile, since his assumption of office in 2015, President Muhammadu Buhari-led federal government has approved the establishment of 30 new tertiary institutions.

Among the new tertiary institutions established by the Buhari government are 11 universities, 10 polytechnics and nine colleges of education.

Amid the establishment of new tertiary institutions, there are public concerns over poor funding of the existing ones as well inadequate budgetary allocations to the education sector.

Rwanda and Zimbabwe have signed an agreement where the latter will send 306 teachers to Kigali as part of efforts to strengthen cooperation and partnership between the two countries.

The development comes just two months after President Paul Kagame, during the two countries trade and investment conference, made the request.

Data from the Ministry of Education indicate that the group consists of 273 Technical and Vocational Training (TVET) teachers as well as 33 who will be deployed in Teacher Training Colleges (TTC).

The Minister of Education, Valentine Uwamariya, said that the deal was drafted in two stages starting with a focus on employment of Zimbabwean English and STEM teachers in Rwanda.

Uwamariya said upon consultations with different institutions on the side of Rwanda and on the side of Zimbabwe, it broadened its scope to focus on exchange of educational personnel and expertise.

She disclosed that Rwanda already started the process of grabbing the opportunities embedded in the agreement.

Under the agreement, teachers will give lessons in associate nursing schools and the college of medicine and health sciences.

According to Zimbabwe’s Minister of Public Service, labour and social welfare, Paul Mavima, Human capital development is critical to delivering Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), but even particularly the aspirations of the African Free Continental Trade Area.

He commended Rwanda for recognizing the professionalism and work ethic of Zimbabweans, which has been witnessed in this exchange of education personnel and expertise.

Schools in Rwanda reopen on January 10, as the country aims to plug learning losses registered under the just-concluded academic year characterised by pandemic-induced closures.

Federal Polytechnic, Ile-Oluji, Ondo State will begin six Higher National Diploma (HND) programmes with effect from the 2021/2022 academic session following the approval of the National Board for Technical Education (NBTE).

The approval was contained in a letter written by NBTE to the rector of the school with reference number TEB/PRO/FP.26/Vol.1/142 dated 23rd December, 2021.

The approval is the outcome of the resource visitation carried out by the board to the institution from 15th to 18th November, 2021.

The approved HND programmes include Computer Engineering Technology; Electrical/Electronic Engineering Technology (Electrical/Telecommunications Option); Electrical/Electronic Engineering Technology (Power/Machines Option); Computer Science; Statistics and Accountancy.

In an issued statement, the institution’s head of information, protocol and passages, Sanmi Enigbokan, said the admission of prospective students into the programmes will commence from the 2021/2022 academic session after which the approved programmes will be due for full accreditation when the first set of students are in their fourth semester of studies.

The rector, Prof Emmanuel Fasakin, expressed profound appreciation to the NBTE for the approval.

The Egyptian Cabinet’s Information and Decision Support Center (IDSC) says that COVID-19 pandemic affected educational process worldwide.

In a press release, the IDSC pointed out to an international report which recommended reopening schools and giving the educational process top priority to end dropouts.

The IDSC was commenting on a joint report issued in December by UNESCO, UNICEF and the World Bank on the status of education worldwide which affirmed that the education process was disrupted as a result of the pathogen and affected 1.6 billion students worldwide.

World Bank Global Director for Education, Jaime Saavedra, said the pandemic brought education systems across the world to a halt.

The international report added that more than 20 months later, millions of children remain shut out of school, while others may never return.

Furthermore, the report said that in low and middle-income countries, the share of children living in “learning poverty” could jump from 53 per cent to 70 per cent.