In a sweeping reform aimed at sanitising Nigeria's education sector, the federal government has announced the introduction of a National Textbook Ranking System for primary, junior and senior secondary schools, setting the stage for a major shake-up in the selection and use of learning materials nationwide.
The initiative, unveiled by the minister of education, Dr Tunji Alausa, alongside the minister of state for education, Prof. Suwaba Sai'd Ahmad, is designed to halt the unchecked proliferation of textbooks in schools and ensure that only high-quality, curriculum-compliant materials make it into classrooms.
Under the new framework, the Nigerian Educational Research and Development Council, NERDC, will retain its statutory role of approving textbooks but will now go a step further by ranking them through a rigorous national evaluation process.
This ranking, officials say, will determine the most suitable and highest-quality textbooks for each subject and level of education.
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To drive the process, NERDC will constitute standing subject committees made up of experts across various disciplines. These committees will subject submitted textbooks to strict academic and pedagogical scrutiny, assessing their relevance, clarity, and alignment with national standards before assigning rankings.
In a decisive move to enforce quality control, only a select number of top-ranked textbooks will be approved for use in schools per subject, effectively eliminating the glut of materials that has long plagued the system and confused teachers, students, and parents alike.
The government further declared that any textbook not ranked under the new system will be barred from classrooms, regardless of its previous licensing status, signalling a firm commitment to raising standards and restoring order in the education sector.
Set to take effect from the September 2026 academic session, the policy will be backed by nationwide sensitisation efforts targeting educators and key stakeholders to ensure compliance.
The government said the reform aligns Nigeria with global best practices in instructional material standardisation and forms part of broader efforts to boost learning outcomes, strengthen quality assurance, and equip students with reliable, high-standard educational resources.
