By Ngozi Nwankwo
National Teachers’ Institute, NTI, Kaduna, has been mandated to coordinate the Accelerated Teacher Professionalisation Pathway, ATPP, a new Federal Government initiative to professionalise serving Nigerian teachers without formal teaching qualifications.
The Director and Chief Executive of NTI, Prof. Sadiya Sani Daura, announced the mandate under the supervision of the Minister of Education, Dr. Tunji Alausa.
The ATPP was initiated by the Minister to address structural weaknesses in Nigeria’s basic education system where a significant number of teachers are neither licensed by the Teachers Registration Council of Nigeria, TRCN, nor covered by professional standards.
“The sole aim of the ATPP is to drive the Federal Government’s intention to professionalise non-professional Nigerian teachers and bridge their qualification gaps,” Daura said.
The programme is designed under the Renewed Hope Agenda to fill the gap without removing the teachers from classrooms. Instead, it seeks to empower and upgrade them.
The programme will be delivered through two routes in blended form: a Postgraduate Diploma in Education, PGDE, for serving teachers with degrees in non-education disciplines, and a Professional Diploma in Education, PDE, for those entering from the National Diploma cadre.
Both routes combine self-paced digital content delivered virtually, structured assessment checkpoints, and a supervised teaching practice component verified in the teachers’ own schools.
NTI will serve as the Coordinating Secretariat. It will work with the Universal Basic Education Commission, UBEC, TRCN, Nigerian Educational Research and Development Council, NERDC, National Senior Secondary Education Commission, NSSEC, National Universities Commission, NUC, and the Federal Ministry of Education.
Daura said curriculum frameworks for both routes have been reviewed, validated and finalised. Module development was carried out by a national panel of about 40 content experts drawn from universities, colleges of education and mandate agencies.
The programme architecture has also been mapped across federal, state and local tiers.
The ATPP is a six-month programme comprising four months of intensive instruction and a two-month teaching practice.
The teaching practice will require a structured practicum, mentor and supervisor protocol, and documented evidence of lessons, pupils’ work and supervisor sign-offs.
“The teaching practice component is most likely to determine whether the pathway produces a change in the classroom or merely a change in paperwork,” the institute stated.
NTI said it will coordinate curriculum, content management and quality assurance in collaboration with UBEC and the ATPP Steering Committee.
The training provides a credible, affordable and time-bound route for serving teachers to obtain TRCN-recognised professional qualifications.
A Sub-Committee on Media and Communication headed by Executive Secretary of NSSEC, Dr. Iyela Ajayi, has finalised the communication strategy. NTI was represented by Head of Public Relations and Protocol, Mal. Yusha’u Ahmed.
The Federal Government expects to engage 250,000 Nigerian teachers. The programme will be launched in October 2026.
