Professor Lois Nnenna Omaka-Amari: A Mother in the Teaching Business

Recognised by Nkuzify as Leading Teacher and Educator of the Year.

Professor Lois Nnenna Omaka-Amari is the owner of Maris and Lois Modern Schools (MALMS) on Ogbaga Road in Abakaliki. She is also a professor and senior lecturer, and a Head of Department, at Ebonyi State University (EBSU). Most people would call that two careers. She carries both, and she carries other people's careers along with her.

A mother in the teaching business

Over the years, Prof. Lois has paid more than 150 teachers and managed more than 50 lecturers. Those are not just numbers on a payroll. Each one is a person who earned a living, gathered experience and grew under her roof. That is why I call her a mother in the teaching business: she gives work, she sets the standard, and she makes room for others to rise.

Teachers moulded under her

Look at the people around her school and you see her influence. Mrs Queen Ese is the administrator. Mrs Oluwarantimi Amarachi (Udoh) is a former principal. Mr Caleb Tochukwu is the current principal. Sharon Chinyere Okpani, one of the most vibrant teachers I know, belongs to this circle of teachers too. A good school leader does not only run a school. She grows the people who will run the next one.

The year I taught under her

I taught at MALMS for more than a year, handling Sciences, Mathematics, Computer, ICT and Digital Literacy. That year gave me a front-row seat to how she runs a school. It is also where a bigger story began: through her influence, and that of Mrs Ese and Mrs Udoh, Nkuzify Tech trained more than 100 of the school's students, each with a login on our portal. Many of them have gone on to do great things.

A scholar as well

Outside the school, Prof. Lois lectures in the Department of Human Kinetics and Health Education at EBSU. She studied at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka (UNN) and holds a PhD. Her research is in public health education, and her published work covers adolescent health, breast cancer knowledge among women in Ebonyi State, physical activity and blood pressure, and substance use in the South-East. Some of it appears in the European Journal of Physical Education and Sport Science. She teaches classrooms of children by day and a whole community through her research.

What she taught me

A school is a long act of care. She has built hers into a place where children and teachers both grow, and I am glad to have taught there. She is married to Amari Omaka, Ebonyi State's Commissioner for Tertiary Education, whom you can read about in our post on the leaders who run Nigeria's education systems.

Thank you, Prof. Lois

Nkuzify recognises her this Teachers' Day, as a teacher, a scholar and a mother in the teaching business.