SECOND-CLASS EDUCATION FOR SECOND-CLASS CITIZENS? AN ASSESSMENT OF SCHOOL INFRASTRUCTURE IN URBAN AND RURAL PUBLIC SECONDARY SCHOOLS IN NIGERIA

Abstract

The study assessed the school infrastructure in Nigeria's urban and rural public secondary schools to ascertain the level of disparities in the availability of these facilities. The studywas to avoid making the students in the rural schools look like second-class citizens
operationally in their own country. The research is theory-based, and adopted historical and descriptive survey research designs for the study; 162 principals of secondary schools were selected using a multistage sampling technique based on clusters of regions, states and locations. The study adopted an instrument titled Infrastructure Availability in Public Secondary Schools in Nigeria Checklist ( IAPSNC) from the National Policy of Education (NPE). Data were analysed using descriptive statistics of frequency count and percentages. The findings established that in urban and rural public secondary schools, infrastructural facilities were not adequately provided but worse in rural areas. The result affirmed the observed discrepancies in the availability of school facilities between urban and rural public secondary schools. Using simple percentages and frequency counts, the findings showed that the highest percentage of availability of the basic school infrastructure was 92.86% and 93.75% for both Biology and Chemistry laboratories in urban and rural schools respectively. Conducive classroom for urban and rural schools had 85.71% and 62.50% of availability. In rural schools, availability of Technology (3.13%), Language (7.81%) and Technical (12.50%) laboratories was recorded while it was 25.51%, 12.24% and 35.71% for the same facilities in the urban schools. The researcher, therefore, recommended, among others, that basic school infrastructure be provided equally in rural and urban public schools, and stakeholders should evolve a public-private partnership in the provision.