REPORT A REVIEW OF OPEN & DISTANCE EDUCATION AND HUMAN DEVELOPMENT IN NIGERIA A Review of Open & Distance Education and Human Development in Nigeria http://dx.doi.org/10.3991/ijet.v9i6.4121 C. K. Ayo, Jonathan A. Odukoya and Ambrose Azeta Covenant University, Ota, Nigeria Abstract—Distance Education have a lot of potential gains – such as meeting the education needs of the teeming popula- tion of qualified students who could not gain admission to tertiary institution; some of these are indigent students who could hardly afford formal tertiary education and so need to work and learn simultaneously. More so, the higher institu- tions in Nigeria are hardly able to absorb 30% of applicants on a yearly basis. With population increase, the situation is becoming aggravated with each passing year. The current state of the study centres needs urgent attention. This study, therefore, focused on empirically ascertaining the state of Open and Distance Education (ODE) in Nigeria and strives to evolve a pragmatic solution to the challenge of ODE in Africa. The research designs adopted for the first phase of this study is the case study design. The second phase of the study is devoted to test-running the proposed Information and Computer Technology (ICT) based solution. From findings in this study, the speculation that there are perti- nent challenges in the current ODE practices in Nigeria has been confirmed. Thus, providing information required for improved platform for ODE implementation in Covenant University and hence the proposed recommendations. Index Terms—Distance Education, Human Development, Open Education, I. INTRODUCTION Nigeria is the most populous black nation in the world with almost 168 million people, 30 million of which are students. Achieving Universal Basic Education (UBE) is a Millennium Development Goal (MDG) that Nigeria aims to achieve by 2015. There is paucity of quality academic staff in virtually all areas, particularly in the critical areas of science and technology (USA, 2012). Nigeria has the challenge of both access and quality of education occa- sioned by poor funding and inadequate manpow- er/infrastructure. The continuous technological advance- ment powered by the internet and the huge impact on learning has brought about a paradigm shift in education. The application of ICT-based learning has great potential for increasing access to university education in Nigeria. The advent of the internet has modernized educational delivery in Nigeria. Several schools and colleges today have started offering online courses. Several academic institutions have been established in Nigeria in the last few years that offer accredited career enhancement pro- grams to students (Sharon, 2012). Despite the proliferation and benefits of Open and Distance Education (ODE) in Nigeria, the quality of delivery and infrastructure has been major concern to stakeholders. The basic characteristic of ODE is the separation of teacher and learner in space and time. The National Uni- versities Commission (NUC), the Supervisory Agency of University Education in Nigeria, in an attempt to ensure that standards are maintained in the operations of distance education enacted some regulations. One of such is the stipulation that the ODE study centres should offer both academic and social support. Students should have easy access to ICT facilities for learning purposes. For specific programs, functional internet access is required at all study centres (NUC, 2013). Operationally, ODE is a formal education system that deploys ICT facilities to communicate, teach, coach and facilitate productive learning amongst students who are domiciled in distant locations. Such education system is said to open because students are not limited by such conditions/factors like age, sex, pregnancy, work, race, religion and so on. It is an education that is open to all. Human Development is the process of nurturing human being to experience optimal cognitive, affective and psy- chomotor development, such that the individual is able to achieve self-actualization within the shortest period of time. The social and economic developments of a country ul- timately depend on the quality of human development. It is universally recognized that investment in human devel- opment is an essential component of a nation’s develop- ment plan (Col-adb, 1999). The issue of human develop- ment and its impact on the society is partly a product of effective delivery of ODE in Nigeria. This has necessitat- ed a yawning need for standard ODE programme. Cove- nant University (CU) is warming up to meet this need. II. LITERATURE REVIEW The history of Distance Education in Nigeria dates back to 1887 with the practice of correspondence education as a means of preparing candidates for the General Certificate in Education, a pre-requisite for the London Matriculation Examination. Thus, University of London was tagged the first “Open University”. In spite of the establishment of a University College in Ibadan in 1948, many of its academ- ic staff passed through the higher degree programs of the University of London as distance learners, which gave them the opportunity to combine work with studies. Con- sequently, a significant number of Nigeria’s early educat- ed elites were products of the British correspondence distance education system. This is the beauty of a well-run Distance Education programme. In Nigeria, the first Distance Education programme was the University of Lagos Correspondence and Open Studies Unit (COSU) programme. Initiated in 1974, it has since iJET ‒ Volume 9, Issue 6, 2014 63