Teachers’ Attendance and Pupils’ Human Capital Formation: Evidence from Rural Schools in Nigeria

The learning and education crises in developing countries are often linked to diverse factors, including low teacher presence in schools, teachers’ absenteeism, low utilisation of their skills, and available resources for teaching. We ask whether improving teachers’ accountability in Nigeria might yield important learning gains for vulnerable children. Although the advocated programme is the introduction of digital technologies in the classroom to ensure teachers’ accountability in school and class attendance, this study aimed to generate evidence to inform the efficient implementation of the technological adoption, and to ensure clear identification of the influences of teachers’ accountability on pupils’ learning outcomes. Using a mixed analytical approach for a field survey in Osun State, Nigeria as a case study, we show that the manual attendance system for teachers is ineffective in improving teachers’ school attendance and pupils’ learning performances because it is prone to manipulation, suggesting the need for a more technologically advanced teacher attendance system.