REINFORCING SECURITY INFRASTRUCTURE AND PROMOTING SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT IN NIGERIAN EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTIONS

Abstract

Education has been conceived globally as the means to attaining social change and sustainable development; however, the achievement of these aims is dependent on the availability of key infrastructures such as financial resources, skilled man power, and efficient security network and so on. This paper argued for the provision of proper security infrastructure as a vital requirement for an efficient Nigerian educational system in the wake of security threats from kidnappers, bandits, cultists and the dreaded ‘Boko Haram’ terrorist sect who have continued to unleash immeasurable havocs on students, teachers, administrators and other stakeholders in the educational sector. The real motive for their unwarranted actions has continued to pose endless questions in the minds of all, especially at a time when there is a clamour for improvement in education practice in various developing countries to promote sustainability. This paper argued that without a proper security network, educational institutions cannot thrive or pursue their goals without distractions. It is recommended that there should be proper commitment from the government, security agencies and resident communities towards strengthening the security infrastructure of all educational institutions if the nation really aims at sustainable development The study adopted a combination of philosophical methods; the analytic method was adopted in discussion of key terms; the speculative method provided insights on the links between various occurrence of security breaches and their long-term impact on Nigerian institutions; the phenomenological method explored factual experiences of the situation while the prescriptive method was employed to provide strategies to mitigate the situation.