One of the iconic projects of the Peter Mbah administration is the Smart Schools in all the 260 wards across the state. It is believed that the innovation would change the face of education in the state.
The Special Adviser to the Governor on Education, and Director of Experiential Learning, Enugu Smart Green School, Chinyere Onyeisi, who conducted BusinessDay round one of the facilities in Owo Campus, Nkanu East Local Government Area, said, “we use Artificial Intelligence; our curriculum content and most of the things we do here are online and tech-based.”
In one of the classrooms, a teacher demonstrated using the smart board that is connected online to show how the teaching in the school is done and how the teachers go to internet to show the pupils examples of the subject matter that is being taught.
“The essence is that when the teaching is mixed with fun, and as the children are seeing those things being demonstrated it sticks in their subconsciousness,” the teacher said.
Onyeisi commended Governor Peter Mbah for the great vision, saying, “Before now, Enugu had high rate of out-of-school children with alarming statistics. We also had the challenge of poor dearth of teachers and poor capacity building of the existing ones as well as lack of curriculum update. The most essential of all the challenges was the inadequate infrastructure. But now, Enugu State Smart Green Schools came into being and disrupted all these challenges.
“Governor Mbah started from providing solutions to the problems of basic education and ended the out-of-school children number with the school feeding programme and the Smart Green Schools, which is free with free books and school uniforms. As you can see, the schools are in all the 260 wards in Enugu State. Most importantly, the skills the children are gaining from the experiential learning cannot be underestimated.”
Onyeisi took the BusinessDay team round the classrooms, innovation hubs, laboratories, and other offices explaining that the target of the state government is to change the face of education in the state and that in the next few years, old teaching methods would be done away with.
The pupils and students are already conscious of the task the new method of teaching/learning has placed on them. In each of the classrooms visited, when they were addressed as ‘smart students”, they responded, “we are the tomorrow that is here’ in line with the mantra of the state government.
The Peter Mbah administration’s motto ‘Tomorrow is here’ is said to raise the people’s consciousness that nobody should be hoping for a tomorrow that will come someday, but that it is here already. So, people must not postpone what should be done today to the next day.
There is a functional CCTV monitoring room where every activity in and around the school is being captured real time. Few meters away from the school is a green farm, where there is a camera that captures all that goes on there. Activities in the farm are also integrated. There is a poultry, piggery, fishpond and green house,
Onyeisi said that 120 crates of eggs are produced from the farm every week. While 60 crates are used in feeding the pupils, 60 crates are used in running the farm. The water coming from the fish pond supplies the green house; the birds’ waste is used in the open farm. “Nothing is wasted in the farm- whatever waste serves other parts of the farm,” she said.
The Director also explained that in line with the vision of the governor, the students are being exposed to innovative skills in special laboratory where they imagine/idealise/conceive problem-solving innovations.
According to her, students are encouraged to come up with ideas from their experiences in their homes that could give vent to innovations that could be used in solving problems.
Onyeisi said that the innovation lab is divided into three hubs- the Idealist hub where concepts are born; the digital/creativity hub (for coding, robotics and Artificial intelligence), and mechatronics hub (for basic technology, assembly and repairs).
Conducting BusinessDay round the hubs, the director displayed some products produced by the students, such as power banks, robots, traffic light, among others. She said that the plan is to produce power banks in commercial quantity, adding that very soon, the school would also begin to produce drones and marketable robots.
Demonstrating the workings of a traffic light (proto type) produced by the students, one of the instructors, said that the unique thing about the product is that unlike usual traffic light, the one produced at the smart school has a unique feature of alerting waiting drivers, by making some sounds as the green light turns on.
“Sometimes, you see that some drivers are not paying attention to the traffic light when they are waiting; some may be even pressing their phones or dozing off behind the wheels, which makes other drivers behind them to begin to horn desperately. But our traffic light has a way of alerting the drivers that it’s time to move. We added sound that is not offensive to the ear,” the instructor said.
On the quality of teachers and the availability of teachers in the state to take up the highly digitized way of teaching, away from the chalk and board method, Onyeisi explained that the schools did not just emerge, but that a lot of work had gone into the planning before they were established. She also said that the state government is investing heavily in training the teachers providing the needed equipment for the smooth and proper running of the schools.
“It is a capital-intensive project because the equipment and instructional materials we use in the school are almost imported; the teachers passed through rigorous training and are frequently updating themselves to ensure that they align with the vision of His Excellency. We are happy about what is going on so far,” she said.
The school also has teachers’ quarters, which is said to be replicated in the 260 wards across the state, adding that the school is tuition-free as no pupil pays anything.
Apart from have the privilege for training in an A-rated environment, the pupils are also fed by the government.
On the vocational aspect of the training, she said that the students are exposed to soap-making, the product of which is used in keeping the school clean.
“The session you see going on is soap-making,” the director said, pointing to students in white overall. “We produce both liquid and bar soaps here. We use the detergent to clean our environment; you can imagine what we would have been spending if we were buying soap in the market. For now, it is not for commercial purposes since we have not registered it. It is just for the school use. We will go commercial soon. So, what we are emphasizing is thinking out of the box kind of innovation to survive in today’s world,” she said.
Asked how the current set of students were admitted and the criteria for admission, she said that about six different schools were brought together, four primary and two secondary schools, from different public schools to serve as pilot scheme.
She also explained that there are about 1000 pupils in the school from Nursery1 to JSS 3.
Earlier, Juliet Okeyeze, head teacher, Enugu Smart Green School Owo Campus, who spoke with BusinessDay, said that the vision of the state governor on education was commendable, adding that in the next few years, Enugu would be the leader in innovative education in the country.
While conducting the visitors through the CCTV room, she said that the technology has helped in putting everybody in the school at alert as every activity is monitored.
“I can tell you that nobody behaves anyhow here; both the teachers and the students are conscious of where they are at every moment, and that has also helped in promoting discipline in the school,” Okeyeze said.
She also showed the visitors clay charcoal stove made by a Primary 6 pupil and a number of handcrafts by other pupils. The Charcoal stove is to beat the high cost of kerosene and it is more economical to use, and cooks very fast too.
Additional report by Regis Anukwuoji
