The Director-General, National Mathematic Centre, Prof. Adewale Solarin, has attributed the high rate of failure in the subject to poor quality of teachers.
He also blamed the failures on the wrong teaching approach adopted by teachers.
The DG, who described failure in the subject as a national problem, called for an emergency in the teaching of algebra in schools.
The NMC boss disclosed these in Abuja at the inauguration of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) Chair Programme on Mathematics on the centre and a Workshop on Algebra.
Prof. Solarin explained that the use of non experts to teach algebra, which is a core subject in the training of mathematicians at the undergraduate level, had not yielded much result.
He said: “We are not calling for emergency in mathematics. We are calling for emergency in algebra.
“The high rate of failure in mathematics is a national problem we are addressing. We have done a lot of pilot survey. “The teaching approach, methodology used by teachers is partly responsible. That is why students have to cram the subject.
“The best way to handle mathematics is to allow the student to discover the concept so that they don’t have to cram the subject.
“If all teachers are trained by us, you can be sure that in the next three years there will be difference.”
He said that the centre had adopted a new approach where students had to discover new concepts and create formulas themselves so as not to cram the subject.
The Minister of Education, Mallam Adamu Adamu, said the award of UNESCO Chair on Mathematics to the centre would be useful to Nigeria as countries seek to share experience and learn from one another to strengthen the education system.
Adamu said that no socio- economic transformation can take root in any nation without sound education in science and technology.
This, he stressed, had made the teaching of mathematics imperative in modern education of Nigeria.
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