The National Teachers’ Institute (NTI) has trained 148 teachers in Kaduna and Benin on climate literacy and green life skills.

The training was in collaboration with the federal ministry of education.

Prof. Musa Maitafsir, the director and chief executive of NTI, disclosed this while declaring open the three-day training at the institute’s headquarters in Kaduna.

Mr Maitafsir said the maiden edition of the training was intended to replace the already known Special Education Needs and Disabilities (SENDs), which had been on for years.

He said the programme had trained teachers across the country and was widely cascaded.

He said, ‘’The Institute, in its effort to maintain its leading role in teacher training, not only in Nigeria but globally, collaborated with esteemed international partners such as the Office of Climate Change Education in Paris and Commonwealth of Learning Vancouver, Canada to design and develop this training.”

Mr Maitafsir said the training was aimed at addressing climate change as a pressing global issue within the Nigerian education landscape.

He said, “The primary objective is to empower Nigerian teachers to effectively impact climate literacy by encouraging students, who are part of the active participants, in the vital task of combating climate change.”

The director stated that NTI was positioned to contribute its quota in achieving the Sustainable Development Goals and rebuilding a sustainable future through enhanced climate change literacy and green life skills for Nigerian teachers.

According to him, NTI decried the lack of opportunities for teachers to update themselves in both knowledge and pedagogy.

Mr Maitafsir said that the majority of the teachers had not received any form of in-service training since their graduation from school.

He, therefore, expressed the institute’s commitment to continue to partner with the relevant stakeholders so as to provide Nigerian teachers with the necessary skills needed to improve their jobs and profession in accordance with current NTI’s mandate and trends in teaching and learning.

The training, which was scheduled between December 13 and 15, had two centres nationwide, including Kaduna and Benin, with 80 and 68 participants, respectively.

Earlier, the chairman of NTI-SDGs Implementation Committee, Dr Ibrahim Bala, said the training coincided with the COP-28, which was held in Dubai, UAE, recently, where about 130 world leaders, including President Bola Tinubu, were in attendance.

“With global temperatures and extreme weather events affecting people around the globe, this year’s United Nations (UN) Climate Change Conference, COP-28, is a pivotal opportunity to correct course and accelerate action to tackle the climate crisis,’’ he said.

Mr Bala, however, urged the participants to give the training the seriousness it deserved.

Also speaking, the institute’s acting registrar and secretary to the council, Fatima Abbas-Jega, enjoined the participants to keep abreast with the developments in regard to climate change and urged them to cascade the training to their colleagues.

(NAN)