BRIEF OF THE MINISTRY
The pivotal position of Ogun State in education and indeed in all fields of learning cannot be over-emphasized. In fact, there is no field of human endeavour in Nigeria, be it medicine, law, accounting arts even politics that does not have an Ogun State indigene in a lead. This could not have been achieved without the comparative advantage of the initial early contact by the State with the early missionary as well as the strong commitment of the State’s founding fathers to provide quality education.
The geographical entity now known as Ogun State has passed through a lot of changes in her history particularly in the Education Sector. History has it that the influx of early Christians Missionaries, who had initial contact with the people in the area, did not only spread the Christian faith, but also introduced and gave them the much desired western education. Therefore, formal Education was introduced to Nigeria and by implication to the State by the Christian Missionaries.
These Christian Missionaries monopolized the provision, financing, control and supervision of the schools between 1842 and 1882. Colonial Government started to contribute to the development of formal education through promulgation of Education Ordinances. The first of such Ordinances was passed in 1882. The Education code of 1916 passed after the amalgamation of Northern and Southern protectorates of Nigeria was intended to reduce differences in education in the two provinces. There came again the 1926 Education Ordinance which strengthened the Board of Education.
The history of formal or western education in Ogun State is dated back to 1846 with the coming to Abeokuta by the Church Missionary Society (CMS) which led to the establishment of a Teacher Training Institute in 1849 and Abeokuta Grammar School in 1908.It also established Ijebu Ode Grammar School in 1913.The spate of development was sporadic such that by 1952, the mission already had 1654 elementary schools, ten secondary schools and thirteen Teacher Training Colleges in what is known today as Nigeria. A substantial number of these institutions were located in Abeokuta and Ijebu Provinces of the present Ogun State.
Ogun State was created in February 1976 with seventy-seven 77 Secondary Schools with a population of 184,420. During the administration of Chief Olabisi Onabanjo between1979 and 1983, free and compulsory Primary and Secondary Education Programme was executed. The State at that period witnessed an upsurge in the number of Public Secondary Schools with an astronomical increase to 335.However, though this was rationalized to 255 by the successive military government, nevertheless the explosion in number of schools and educational institutions has continued unabated.
Ogun State today, is foremost and has a comparative advantage among States in the Federation which place very high premium on the education of her citizens. Little wonder that Ogun State is the homestead of many education icons in Nigeria such as the Chief Obafemi Awolowo, the Kutis, Dr. Tai Solarin, Prof Wole Soyinka, Prof Afolabi Olabimtan, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo to mention but a few.
To develop a purposeful, inclusive and engaging education system that produces successful, inspired, self-motivated lifelong learners, who possess the skills and knowledge necessary to be productive contributors to the State and the changing world
The Ministry is one of the oldest and biggest Ministries in the Civil Service of Ogun State dated back to 1976 when the State was created. It consists of nine (9) Professional Departments and two (2) "Common Services" Departments totalling Twelve (12) Departments; namely:
The Ministry has twenty (20) Zonal Offices, eight (8) Government Science and Technical Colleges Including a Vocational Centre, and One (1) functional Model College. It also supervises the following Agencies and Institutions of the State Government especially in the absence of a Constituted Board or Council. They are namely:
