Minna — A week-long workshop to review the minimum standard for the National Certificate of Education (NCE) teachers' education commenced in Minna on Monday.

Declaring the workshop open, the co-ordinator of the Universal Basic Education (UBE), Professor Gidido Tahir, welcomed the review exercise and urged all the colleges of education to embrace the outcome of the exercise.

Professor Tashir said that since the success of the Universal Basic Education is hinged on the qualities of teachers, the UBE was determined as a stakeholders to see that the review succeeded.

The co-ordinator urged that training of the students should be taken as a serious business, adding that: "It should be comprehensive enough to equip them with reasonable understanding of the subject matter, including the contents of the curriculum of the primary school."

Speaking at the occasion, the Executive Secretary of the National Commission for Colleges of Education, Dr. Kabir Isyaku said: "All the federal colleges of education in Nigeria produce 45,000 graduates annually, which is the minimum standard of the primary education teachers."

But complained that it was an unfortunate thing for some governments to stick to the employment of Grade II teachers, and to some extent re-opening teachers' colleges - an old system, which portends bad future for the nation's education sector.

Speaking during the occasion, World Bank representative, Miss. Andrey Arous, applauded the efforts of Nigerian teachers but stressed that much needed to be done in the areas of communication method, literacy and numeracy and comparison of notes by them in order to complement one another's efforts.