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No fewer than 10,000 applicants competed for 1,000 primary school teaching positions approved by the Nasarawa State Government under a rural recruitment programme aimed at addressing teacher shortages in underserved communities.
The Senior Special Assistant to Governor Abdullahi Sule on Public Affairs, Peter Ahemba, disclosed this on Monday during a bi-monthly press briefing at the Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ) Secretariat in Lafia.
According to Ahemba, the recruitment exercise, being conducted by the Nasarawa State Universal Basic Education Board (SUBEB), is intended to strengthen basic education by deploying qualified teachers to rural schools across the state’s 13 local government areas.
He said the government engaged an independent consulting firm to manage the recruitment process instead of relying on internal procedures in order to guarantee transparency, fairness and credibility.
Ahemba revealed that although more than 10,000 applications were received from candidates with qualifications ranging from the Nigeria Certificate in Education (NCE) to diplomas and university degrees, only about 8,000 applicants participated in the screening examination.
Of those who sat for the examination, only 600 candidates passed, falling short of the government’s target of recruiting 1,000 teachers.
He explained that the consulting firm has completed its assignment and submitted the outcome of the screening to SUBEB, which is now reviewing the process ahead of the next phase of the recruitment exercise.
Ahemba assured applicants that the selection process would remain merit-based and that successful candidates would be posted exclusively to rural schools to help bridge the shortage of teachers in hard-to-reach communities.
He urged applicants to await further communication from SUBEB and the consulting firm regarding the next stage of the recruitment process.
