The Lagos State Government through the Office of Education Quality Assurance (OEQA) has again reiterated its commitment to raising the bar of quality education in sustaining the overall goal of education policy in its T. H. E. M. E. S. Agenda through the two-day capacity building workshop for school evaluators to imbibe the International Organisation for Standardisation (ISO) Certification in evaluating schools below the tertiary level across the State.
The Executive Training Programme held for Management Staff on Thursday and Friday at the Lagos Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Olowopopo Road, Alausa was organised by the Office of Education Quality Assurance (OEQA) in Lagos State.
The Director General, OEQA, Mrs Abiola Seriki-Ayeni speaking on the last day of the training emphasised the importance of school evaluators being equipped with international best practices for them to manage their roles efficiently and effectively on the minimum standards for evaluation of schools in the State.
“Heaps and heaps of backlog led us to where we are, but there is hope if we look at what we are supposed to do and we are focus by asking what the mandates says”? She said.
Mrs Seriki-Ayeni noted that the importance of the workshop was to promote synergy between the civil service policy on education and quality assurance based on international specifications to align evaluators roles for competence in achieving the expected quality in the management of education in the State.
Mrs Seriki-Ayeni while responding to interviews from the press said that the two days workshop was meant for the participants to benefit from the core knowledge of assuring quality of standard education, the cost, minimum requirements, identifying the existing gabs, and coming up with solutions as competent evaluators.
The Special Adviser to the Governor on Parastatals Monitoring Office (PMO), Mr Afolabi Ayantayo in his goodwill message encouraged the participants to know that they are handling a very critical assignment for the State and should be done effectively.
According to him, “Education is the most essential infrastructure in the world. What you are doing is the most essential function of the State Government.”
He added that without knowledge, nothing good could be achieved and that is why developed countries in the world are always having a constant overhaul of their educational policy.
The Executive Training Programme facilitator, Mr Oluwagbenga Bamgbose, Lead Consultant, GUUT Technologies Limited who took the participants on the two-day capacity building workshop exposed the participants on the requirements of International Organisation for Standardisation (ISO) as a common model for school evaluators to be well informed in carrying out school assessments.
Mr Bamgbose in handling the various modules of Education Organisations Management Systems (EOMS) said that the emphasis of the International Organisation for Standardisation (ISO) Workshop was about “doing it equally”, meaning to have an “equal” or “standard” model for solving educational institutions’ problems.
He maintained that the overall success of the workshop was to enable the participants to draft new and better laws that can help the State to enforce school certification on all stakeholders to promote equitable standards on both public and private education in the State.
At the closing session, a competence test was conducted for participants to measure their knowledge of the International Organisation for Standardisation (ISO) which focuses on the “requirements” and ” satisfaction” to bother learners, labour market and government. Certificates were issued to all participants at the end of the training.
