It’s just Tobi and Feyi in the studio this week, diving into a conversation that started with a simple question: How could AI actually transform Nigeria - and Africa more broadly?
I truly enjoyed this podcast. You touched on something very poignant, the schooling-versus-learning crisis currently bedevilling Nigeria.
It’s no exaggeration to say that, even as you alluded to here, despite increased investment in education over the past two decades, Nigeria’s progress has been more about expanding schooling than improving learning. No doubt, enrolment rates have risen significantly under the Universal Basic Education (UBE) programme, and more schools have been built across the country, even in places where classrooms are not needed. (UBEC has said they plan to revise this in their Act; we await the final amendments.)
Yet learning outcomes remain alarmingly low. The World Bank in 2022 estimates that about 70% of Nigerian children cannot read and understand a simple text by age 10. Erratic and inconsistent national assessments also reveal that a large proportion of pupils in upper primary cannot perform basic arithmetic.
Thinking about the assessment issue Tobi mentioned, I realise it's a political minefield. The results are almost always bad news for politicians. Here in my state, for instance, education is tuition-free, which sounds great. But it means that if an exam shows a huge number of students failing at a particular school, the principal is in for a world of pain. To escape the government's rage, teachers and principals are essentially forced to invent better grades for their students.
When Tobi mentioned the 40,000 sacked teachers, I laughed out loud here in the office. Sadly, most states are not sincere about revealing the true staff strength of teachers on their payroll. As someone working in the primary education sector (SUBEB), it is hard to believe that I do not even know the total number of primary school teachers in my own state (O**).
Equally troubling is how this same lack of transparency is extended to development partners who spend huge amounts on our education sector.
The same goes for enrolment numbers. Officers are never allowed to give accurate figures. Two sets of enrolment sheets are always created, one "political" and one "actual." It's a behemoth issue.
Anytime I want to discuss the issue of Cement in any fora, my to go reading has always been your "Konkere" article. 😂. FF and the billionaire.
Thank you for this detailed comment. It really bothers me that we are not taking the Learning crisis seriously. It's like leaving billions of dollars on the sidewalk. A study by Eric Hanushek once estimated that we can increase global GDP by up to $700 trillion just by closing the basic skills gap in education.
I am glad I tuned in for this. Huge fan. This one struck close to work.
What can AI do for Nigeria?
I would hope to answer that question. I must apologize. I am not sure I write that good.
AI is a revolutionary tech, when I say AI I am referring to machine learning neural networks. You provide training data to a neutral network with the expectation that when your model processes data out in the wild, it can correctly provide a relationship based on training data.
This neural networks have been successful in applications such as computer vision, which I have been privileged to work with.
These neural networks has found successful applications also in Large Language Models. So when folks talk about AI these days, most likely refer to LLMs.
However, LLMs aren't going to be impactful such as the Internet or smartphone. At least not yet, there's a handful of challenges bedeviling its potential. Neural networks require incredibly high powered hardware for training and inference. A barrier to scaling to ubiquitous devices such as smartphones and laptops. There are numerous other challenges that I would restrain from listing as I suspect being verbose would obfuscate my point.
AI is next level tech built upon existing infrastructure. Infrastructure that requires high capacity educated population.
AI is already being used in dumber forms, software apps, search engines, etc.
There's nothing new to see if Nigeria hasn't utilized the existing possibilities that tech offers, and it's not really hard to see.
AI is not cheap. It's highly subsidized right now thanks to the hype. The pressure to find the successful utility for AI that would contribute to productivity is still high in the wind.
There are also the hard realities of AI use. We are witnessing in real time in the software space how speed of churning out code doesn't improve existing software products, or help you figure out stuff that people would buy.
I fear that AI compressing the training of teachers would not impact learning outcomes for students.
There's just so much hype right now that it's almost career suicide to correctly assess what is possible with AI, you jump on the hype train or you keep mum. My spicy opinion is there's a plateau right now and there's nothing new to see unless a new breakthrough in the hardware or new methodology arises. The next 1 year would be totally interesting in the AI space.
I really enjoyed this episode as I have everything you guys put out on here. I think you do a very good job detailing out critical issues and proffering solutions.
On the AI revolution, as one who is currently working in education, I think the current hype around LLMs may be clouding judgements as to the limits of the possibilities of AI in its current iteration especially in education. I have found in teaching that an underestimated amount of work goes into developing course content and delivering it in a manner tailored to students' abilities to ensure the attainment of of learning outcomes. I think the critical piece in the study referenced is the inclusion of teachers in the deployment of these technologies in teaching. As later discussed, studies have shown the folly of of assuming AI on its own is an answer. Personally I have come to believe that AI in education is really principally some sort of advanced learning aid - a modern day textbook which in itself would not improve student education but in the hands of a skilled educator, makes a world of difference. Essentially, this among other reasons is why we seemingly have a lot of schooling but very limited education in my opinion. This is where retrospectively I think there was a missed opportunity a few years ago in the failed opon imo project in Osun state. I thought the original idea was worth pursuing, as I believe that a real stumbling block in improving the quality of education in Nigeria is students and educators access to proper/high quality teaching aids aka textbooks. Now with the recent AI revolution, that could have become something of an add on to such tablets and with the advantage of some years of experience in deploying the technology, a roll out would have been a bit easier. But then there was a huge uproar which I was a little befuddled about. Knowing Nigeria, the whole plan was probably mired in corruption and incompetence that it would seem designed to fail so maybe that was the reason for skepticism. But I think there was something in the underlying idea that can be the basis for the deployment of such a technology.
On other uses of AI, I think eventually we are simply going to become consumers once the Chinese figure out how to put it into everything they send our way. It is already that way with most other things and so while it may offer a small improvement to the quality of lives, unless something drastic changes, we will still be left behind sadly.
About 'konkree' and that certain billionaire who I am sure must have dragged babe with Feyi in another life, I look at it in a slightly different way. I am not exactly sure what you refer to when using the word 'build'. Do you mean the physical structures or the design, fabrication and installation of the equipment? In all these aspects, I do not think Nigerians cannot build a cement factory especially with the democratization of knowledge in today's world and the globalization of technologies. Really all it would take would be collaboration between a Nigerian company and Chinese counterparts on one project to build capacity. However, at an increased cost both financially and time wise as well as increased risks, what wealthy person is going to trust billions to basically untested Nigerians to build? Seems like quite a gamble. The only people in a country that would take such risks to build capacity is the government and well the Nigerian government no longer builds cement factories so capacity building in that area may not be forthcoming. Look around at the construction companies that employ significant amounts of Nigerian talent and you will notice something - they are either mostly government contractors and thus obliged to develop local talent, and/or work in industries (oil servicing in particular) that have very strict local content laws. A private citizen on the other hand without these constraints, is simply looking to build quickly and maximize profit. There really is no incentive for him to take the risk or spend the resources developing local talent in a niche as limited as building a cement factory where there is no real long term profitability. This is why I usually posit that societal development is socialist in nature. Individual wealth and prosperity is built by capitalist initiatives, but no society develops long term without being inherently socialist irrespective of the guise it is presented in.
I truly enjoyed this podcast. You touched on something very poignant, the schooling-versus-learning crisis currently bedevilling Nigeria.
It’s no exaggeration to say that, even as you alluded to here, despite increased investment in education over the past two decades, Nigeria’s progress has been more about expanding schooling than improving learning. No doubt, enrolment rates have risen significantly under the Universal Basic Education (UBE) programme, and more schools have been built across the country, even in places where classrooms are not needed. (UBEC has said they plan to revise this in their Act; we await the final amendments.)
Yet learning outcomes remain alarmingly low. The World Bank in 2022 estimates that about 70% of Nigerian children cannot read and understand a simple text by age 10. Erratic and inconsistent national assessments also reveal that a large proportion of pupils in upper primary cannot perform basic arithmetic.
Thinking about the assessment issue Tobi mentioned, I realise it's a political minefield. The results are almost always bad news for politicians. Here in my state, for instance, education is tuition-free, which sounds great. But it means that if an exam shows a huge number of students failing at a particular school, the principal is in for a world of pain. To escape the government's rage, teachers and principals are essentially forced to invent better grades for their students.
When Tobi mentioned the 40,000 sacked teachers, I laughed out loud here in the office. Sadly, most states are not sincere about revealing the true staff strength of teachers on their payroll. As someone working in the primary education sector (SUBEB), it is hard to believe that I do not even know the total number of primary school teachers in my own state (O**).
Equally troubling is how this same lack of transparency is extended to development partners who spend huge amounts on our education sector.
The same goes for enrolment numbers. Officers are never allowed to give accurate figures. Two sets of enrolment sheets are always created, one "political" and one "actual." It's a behemoth issue.
Anytime I want to discuss the issue of Cement in any fora, my to go reading has always been your "Konkere" article. 😂. FF and the billionaire.
Thank you for this detailed comment. It really bothers me that we are not taking the Learning crisis seriously. It's like leaving billions of dollars on the sidewalk. A study by Eric Hanushek once estimated that we can increase global GDP by up to $700 trillion just by closing the basic skills gap in education.
I am glad I tuned in for this. Huge fan. This one struck close to work.
What can AI do for Nigeria?
I would hope to answer that question. I must apologize. I am not sure I write that good.
AI is a revolutionary tech, when I say AI I am referring to machine learning neural networks. You provide training data to a neutral network with the expectation that when your model processes data out in the wild, it can correctly provide a relationship based on training data.
This neural networks have been successful in applications such as computer vision, which I have been privileged to work with.
These neural networks has found successful applications also in Large Language Models. So when folks talk about AI these days, most likely refer to LLMs.
However, LLMs aren't going to be impactful such as the Internet or smartphone. At least not yet, there's a handful of challenges bedeviling its potential. Neural networks require incredibly high powered hardware for training and inference. A barrier to scaling to ubiquitous devices such as smartphones and laptops. There are numerous other challenges that I would restrain from listing as I suspect being verbose would obfuscate my point.
AI is next level tech built upon existing infrastructure. Infrastructure that requires high capacity educated population.
AI is already being used in dumber forms, software apps, search engines, etc.
There's nothing new to see if Nigeria hasn't utilized the existing possibilities that tech offers, and it's not really hard to see.
AI is not cheap. It's highly subsidized right now thanks to the hype. The pressure to find the successful utility for AI that would contribute to productivity is still high in the wind.
There are also the hard realities of AI use. We are witnessing in real time in the software space how speed of churning out code doesn't improve existing software products, or help you figure out stuff that people would buy.
I fear that AI compressing the training of teachers would not impact learning outcomes for students.
There's just so much hype right now that it's almost career suicide to correctly assess what is possible with AI, you jump on the hype train or you keep mum. My spicy opinion is there's a plateau right now and there's nothing new to see unless a new breakthrough in the hardware or new methodology arises. The next 1 year would be totally interesting in the AI space.
Sorry about the lengthy text. Cheers.
I really enjoyed this episode as I have everything you guys put out on here. I think you do a very good job detailing out critical issues and proffering solutions.
On the AI revolution, as one who is currently working in education, I think the current hype around LLMs may be clouding judgements as to the limits of the possibilities of AI in its current iteration especially in education. I have found in teaching that an underestimated amount of work goes into developing course content and delivering it in a manner tailored to students' abilities to ensure the attainment of of learning outcomes. I think the critical piece in the study referenced is the inclusion of teachers in the deployment of these technologies in teaching. As later discussed, studies have shown the folly of of assuming AI on its own is an answer. Personally I have come to believe that AI in education is really principally some sort of advanced learning aid - a modern day textbook which in itself would not improve student education but in the hands of a skilled educator, makes a world of difference. Essentially, this among other reasons is why we seemingly have a lot of schooling but very limited education in my opinion. This is where retrospectively I think there was a missed opportunity a few years ago in the failed opon imo project in Osun state. I thought the original idea was worth pursuing, as I believe that a real stumbling block in improving the quality of education in Nigeria is students and educators access to proper/high quality teaching aids aka textbooks. Now with the recent AI revolution, that could have become something of an add on to such tablets and with the advantage of some years of experience in deploying the technology, a roll out would have been a bit easier. But then there was a huge uproar which I was a little befuddled about. Knowing Nigeria, the whole plan was probably mired in corruption and incompetence that it would seem designed to fail so maybe that was the reason for skepticism. But I think there was something in the underlying idea that can be the basis for the deployment of such a technology.
On other uses of AI, I think eventually we are simply going to become consumers once the Chinese figure out how to put it into everything they send our way. It is already that way with most other things and so while it may offer a small improvement to the quality of lives, unless something drastic changes, we will still be left behind sadly.
About 'konkree' and that certain billionaire who I am sure must have dragged babe with Feyi in another life, I look at it in a slightly different way. I am not exactly sure what you refer to when using the word 'build'. Do you mean the physical structures or the design, fabrication and installation of the equipment? In all these aspects, I do not think Nigerians cannot build a cement factory especially with the democratization of knowledge in today's world and the globalization of technologies. Really all it would take would be collaboration between a Nigerian company and Chinese counterparts on one project to build capacity. However, at an increased cost both financially and time wise as well as increased risks, what wealthy person is going to trust billions to basically untested Nigerians to build? Seems like quite a gamble. The only people in a country that would take such risks to build capacity is the government and well the Nigerian government no longer builds cement factories so capacity building in that area may not be forthcoming. Look around at the construction companies that employ significant amounts of Nigerian talent and you will notice something - they are either mostly government contractors and thus obliged to develop local talent, and/or work in industries (oil servicing in particular) that have very strict local content laws. A private citizen on the other hand without these constraints, is simply looking to build quickly and maximize profit. There really is no incentive for him to take the risk or spend the resources developing local talent in a niche as limited as building a cement factory where there is no real long term profitability. This is why I usually posit that societal development is socialist in nature. Individual wealth and prosperity is built by capitalist initiatives, but no society develops long term without being inherently socialist irrespective of the guise it is presented in.
Great comment, thank you!
Interesting episode. Thank you for recording and posting it.