The opportunities that joining the World Trade Organization (WTO) will unlock for Ethiopia, which is negotiating to join the international body, were the focus of an article published in University World News on 21 August 2025.

With its exclusive focus on the benefits of the WTO for higher education, the contribution highlighted positive outcomes for a country such as Ethiopia: global integration, improved standards, attracting foreign investment, easy access to foreign institutions, opportunities for staff and student mobility, and enhanced quality through competition.

These benefits are theoretically sound and are often trumpeted by advocates pursuing access to the WTO General Agreement on Trade in Services, or WTO-GATS. Indeed, WTO membership can create opportunities for foreign education investment in a country, additional access through the presence of foreign operators, and help align the system with international standards and working systems.

Plans are underway to scale programmes nationwide and intensify policy advocacy to ensure education, gender equality, and social inclusion remain central to Nigeria’s development agenda. The Executive Director of Ilimi Children’s Fund, Maryam Augie-Abdulmumin, disclosed this in a statement on Thursday while marking the Foundation’s fourth anniversary.

She revealed that the organisation has trained 2,300 adolescent girls in digital literacy over the past four years as part of efforts to bridge the gender digital divide, reaching more than 40,000 people across 40 communities through initiatives in education, gender equality, and social inclusion.

“Over the past four years, we have witnessed resilience, collaboration, and the undeniable power of education to transform lives. Every child who learns, every girl who gains a skill, and every teacher who is empowered reminds us that positive change is possible when we act together,” Augie-Abdulmumin stated.

The Executive Secretary of the Universal Basic Education Commission (UBEC), Hajia Aisha Garba, has said the agency will explore new ways to improve efficiency, foster innovation, and deliver on its mandate. Hajiya Garba spoke yesterday in Ikeja at the commission’s two-day retreat for Senior Staff-Phase 2.

The UBEC boss said the retreat was a critical step in advancing the commission’s goals of the 2025–2028 Strategic Blueprint. She said the commission had taken important steps to enhance the quality of teaching and learning through the Teacher Professional Development (TPD) programme.

“We are equipping educators with the knowledge and tools they need to deliver better outcomes for children nationwide. “Our mandate is ambitious because we are shaping the future of millions of Nigerian children. The way we plan, collaborate, and lead has a direct impact on what happens in classrooms across the country,” she said.

Every child carries within them the potential to succeed, yet the path to unlocking that potential is rarely identical. Children learn in different ways, at different paces, and through different experiences. Despite this, many classrooms continue to rely on a rigid, one-size-fits-all approach that fails to accommodate the rich diversity of learning styles.

This model often leaves countless students at a disadvantage, not because they lack ability, but because the system fails to meet them where they are. A classroom should be more than just a physical space filled with desks and chalkboards. It ought to be a living, breathing community—a place where children with varied ways of understanding come together to grow.

I came to appreciate this truth during my undergraduate years at the University of Ilorin, particularly through the tutorial groups I led with my course mates. These sessions, informal and collaborative, became some of the most powerful learning experiences of my academic life.

The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) has said education is the strongest weapon to end the cycle of poverty in Nigeria, particularly in the North-East, where millions of children remain out of school after more than a decade of Boko Haram insurgency.

UNICEF Nigeria Country Representative, Wafaa Saeed, said in Maiduguri on Thursday while briefing journalists on the agency’s programmes in Borno, Yobe and Adamawa, noting that returning children to school is urgent and critical for the survival of families and the future of the nation.

According to her, “Education is an accelerator. Even mothers who never went to school want their children to learn. Getting children back to school prevents exploitation, child marriage and lost futures,” Saeed said. She recounted meeting Fatima, a 15-year-old mother in Maiduguri, whose baby is recovering from malnutrition at the University of Maiduguri Teaching Hospital. Although Fatima never attended school herself, she told the UNICEF team that her dream is for her daughter to complete her education.

The Executive Secretary of the Universal Basic Education Commission, Aisha Garba, has reaffirmed the Federal Government’s commitment to expanding inclusive and equitable education across Nigeria, with a particular focus on riverine and historically significant communities.

“As part of our ongoing campaign for inclusive and equitable education for every Nigerian child, I embarked on an inspection tour across riverine communities in Lagos State, covering Ibeshe, Moba, Ojo, Olorunda, and Badagry LGAs”, her statement partly read.

“Highlights of the tour included an inspection of the Smart School project at Epeme Village, Olorunda LCDA, where I reassured His Royal Majesty, Oba Kososko, the Kabiyesi of Iworo, and his people of our commitment to complete and deliver the facility soon to serve as a model of innovation and quality learning in the region,” she continued.

Ghana has taken significant steps toward making higher education more inclusive. Firstly, Ghana’s Inclusive Education Policy and the Persons with Disability Act (2006) aim to provide equal opportunities in education. Universities are obliged to accommodate students with disabilities and make reasonable adjustments.

Secondly, some institutions, including the University of Ghana, University of Cape Coast, University of Education, Winneba and Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, have disability support offices to assist students with special needs.

These offices provide assistive technology, counselling and academic support. Again, with digital advancements, some students with disabilities now have access to screen readers, braille resources and voice recognition software to aid their studies. Some lecturers embrace e-learning platforms, making learning flexible.

Abia State Governor, Alex Otti, has commenced the induction and training of 5,349 newly recruited teachers across early childhood, primary and secondary school levels. The programme, which began on Monday in Umuahia and Aba, is part of ongoing reforms aimed at positioning the state as a hub of educational excellence.

This was disclosed in a statement signed by Special Adviser on Basic and Secondary Education to the Governor, Kenechukwu Nwosu, on Monday. According to the statement, the training programme is being facilitated by the Education Reform Implementation Team with support from Lead Master Trainers previously trained under the AbiaFIRST initiative.

It read in part, “The recruitment and training of teachers is a direct response to UNESCO’s alarming projection that 44 million additional teachers are needed globally by 2030 to achieve Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 4 on quality education.

The Federal Government on Monday unveiled a new digital portal designed to streamline teachers’ registration, licensing, and professional development while also introducing measures to strengthen accountability and safety in Nigerian classrooms.

At the launch of the portal and the Strategic Vision for Nigerian Teachers in Abuja, Minister of Education, Dr. Tunji Alausa, said the reforms would not only professionalise teaching but also ensure ethical standards. According to him, the new framework includes a mandatory Teacher Ethics and Criminal Record Verification System that all teachers must undergo before certification or renewal.

“This is not punitive; it is protective,” Alausa said. “It is about safeguarding our children and upholding the moral integrity of our classrooms.” He added that private schools will be required to verify the Teachers Registration Council of Nigeria (TRCN) clearance of their staff through the secure portal.

Member chapters of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), across the country have warned of an impending crisis in the university system over the alleged government’s inaction on long-standing issues affecting the sector, describing it as ‘wicked and heartless’.

On a protest march to register their anger with the government yesterday were the ASUU Chapters of the University of Lagos, the Federal University of Technology (FUTA), Akure, Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka, Usman Danfodio University, Sokoto State University, Shehu Shagari University of Education, Sokoto, University of Ilorin, Federal University Lokoja, the University of Port Harcourt, University of Benin, and several others.

Addressing journalists, the Chairman of ASUU, FUTA, Prof. Pius Mogaji said the government’s alleged failure to address issues such as the re-negotiation of the 2009 ASUU-FGN Agreement, sustainable funding of universities, and the plight of retired academic staff, threatens the very foundation of higher education in Nigeria.

The Executive Secretary of the Universal Basic Education Commission (UBEC), Aisha Garba, has reaffirmed the Commission’s commitment to bridging the gap between planning and performance in Nigeria’s basic education sector towards ensuring access to quality education for every Nigerian child.

Delivering her remarks at the 27th Quarterly Meeting of UBEC Management with the Executive Chairmen of the State Universal Basic Education Boards (SUBEBs), Garba highlighted the significant strides made in reforming and repositioning the sector, noting that progress recorded so far is only a first step towards achieving greater impact.

She listed some of the key achievements to include the revision of the UBEC matching grant formula to improve data-driven resource allocation, equity and accountability; improved states’ access to financing for basic education through UBEC matching grants, with 27 out of the 36+1 states accessing part of the N121 billion un-accessed matching grants backlogs from 2024, representing a 65 per cent increase.

The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) in partnership with the University of Lagos (UNILAG), and others unveiled Nigeria’s first Behavioural, Insights, Research, and Design Laboratory (BIRD-Lab) to deepen understanding of human behaviour and improve development outcomes.

Kshitij Joshi, chief of social and behavioural change at UNICEF speaking at the unveiling at UNILAG’s College of Medicine, Idi-Araba, on Friday, said, the pioneering initiative marks a major step forward in using evidence-based research to shape policies and programmes that better serve children and communities across Nigeria.

“UNILAG is just the beginning, we will have similar labs in other universities as well, more importantly, it’s a concept, and an approach; the physical space is just one manifestation. “It’s a platform for students, private sector, and the media to collaborate and contribute to understanding and unpacking what drives Nigeria,” he said.