I remember someone who was once offered a job as a Lecturer and rejected it outright. He laughed it off, declaring that such a life was not for him, and those around him joined in the laughter. Someone even joked that they thought he would at least use the job to “discipline his body.” The moment passed as banter, but it stayed with me.
That story is not unusual. Many people who have options walk away from lecturing jobs, leaving them for those with fewer alternatives. High unemployment has pushed many into academia, not out of passion, but necessity. Yet, paradoxically, lecturing remains a prestigious job for many from average homes, especially for those with the opportunity to further their education or who graduate with good results. In some communities where tertiary institutions are the main drivers of local economies, lecturers are seen as symbols of success. To such communities, the job looks like a goldmine, a ladder many can climb to escape poverty.
This perception becomes clearer when lecturing is compared with teaching at primary and secondary school levels. In Nigeria, few labels damage social prospects faster than being called “just a teacher.” Tell a woman or her family that a suitor is a teacher and watch the mood change instantly; the pity in their eyes can be unmistakable. Teachers, perhaps more than any other professionals I know, are constantly searching for a way out, hoping to replace teaching with something they consider progress. A friend once remarked, half-jokingly and half-sadly, that those who reject teachers as suitors are often teachers themselves or children of teachers. That irony is as painful as it is revealing. It reminds me of a headline I once saw in the Daily Trust during World Teachers’ Week: “Who Wants to Be a Teacher?” The question was rhetorical, but the answer was deeply unsettling.
For lecturers, the prestige is real, especially for those without alternatives, but it is constantly undermined by crushing workloads. An entry-level Graduate Assistant earning around ₦130,000 monthly soon realizes that the job feels eerily similar to the national service they thought they had left behind after NYSC: demanding, consuming, and relentless. I have a friend, Dr. Nuhu Tanko at UDUS, who hardly responds to messages. Whenever I finally have to call him, I find myself apologizing and rushing my words because he is either in a lecture, preparing one, or attending to students. It is a kind of labour that anyone without deep passion would never envy.
Beyond teaching, lecturers prepare multiple lecture notes across different levels each semester, set and mark tests and examinations, supervise undergraduate and postgraduate research, and attend countless defenses, both internal and external. At any given time, a lecturer may be supervising no fewer than fifteen students per set, and just as one group completes its defense, another arrives. Add SIWES supervision, logbook assessments, report evaluations, and defenses, and the cycle becomes endless. This is why, when Nigerian lecturers were recently mocked online for allegedly recycling examination questions year after year, I found myself conflicted. Critics argued that students only need past questions to pass, not real understanding. I countered that if a lecturer truly wants mass failure, all they need to do is set entirely new questions, not necessarily difficult ones. The system itself discourages innovation by punishing it.
And still, that is not all. I know an unemployed graduate who once dreamed of becoming a lecturer simply because it seemed readily available. He runs a computer business centre and lost interest instantly after helping my wife photocopy and bind the bulky documents she submitted for her promotion. He stared at the pile in disbelief and asked whether that was really what lecturers had to compile before promotion, when people in ministries only filled a form. I told him she spent nearly half her salary on those documents alone, not counting the cost of further education, research materials, publishing requirements, community service, and the pressure to earn a PhD just to avoid stagnation. From that day, he stopped applying for lecturing positions and quietly redirected his ambition toward becoming a technologist.
Yet, something is changing.
With the renewed optimism and national mood under President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s administration, one begins to sense a shift. In the coming days, it may not be surprising if everyone starts dreaming of becoming a lecturer, or better still, a professor. Despite the heavy workload, academia has always had a quiet advantage: flexibility, intellectual growth, and a promotion system that actually rewards qualification and productivity within a reasonable timeframe. Unlike the rigid structures of ministries, lecturers can rise on merit, regardless of their original discipline, to become vice chancellors or even chief executives.
In academic life, the ceiling is remarkably high.
When this inherent advantage is combined with the new welfare initiatives being rolled out, it becomes obvious why the lecturing job may soon rank among the best in the country. The Federal Government’s plan to fund the Tertiary Institutions Staff Support Fund, in collaboration with TETFund and the Bank of Industry, is a major turning point. Under this transparent, online-driven scheme, confirmed academic and non-academic staff with sufficient years before retirement can access up to ₦10 million in interest-free loans, repayable over five years with a one-year moratorium. The funds can be used for medical care, housing, transportation, small businesses, academic advancement, or professional certification.
For academics, this is more than a loan scheme; it is a form of social security, a buffer against life’s unexpected blows. Scholars like Abraham Maslow long argued that productivity thrives when basic needs and security are assured, and research consistently shows that welfare and motivation are strongly linked to performance. By strengthening staff welfare, the system strengthens education itself.
Add to this the breaking of a sixteen-year jinx of unresolved agreements with academic unions, achieved without industrial action or academic disruption, and the moment becomes truly unprecedented. Reports of a 40 percent salary increment, a ₦140,000 professorial allowance, and an enhanced retirement age of 70 years with full salary as pension place professors in a league few Nigerian professionals can rival. What job today offers such a blend of income growth, security, prestige, and longevity?
One of the deepest fears among Nigerian civil servants has always been retirement, a phase often marked by uncertainty, delayed pensions, and hardship. To imagine academics retiring at 70, financially secure, intellectually active, and still valuable as consultants, resource persons, or political appointees, is to imagine something close to paradise on earth. It is difficult to find another profession that promises such long-term security and relevance.
So yes, I am genuinely happy for her. My wife is always fond of asking, jokingly, “If lecturing is so good, why don’t you want to be one?” My answer now is simple: with the renewed hope replacing the despair that once prevailed in Nigeria, where stability and dignity at work are rare, who wouldn’t want to be a lecturer, let alone a professor?
Bagudu can be reached at bagudumohammed15197@gmail.com or on 0703 494 3575.
