Boosting Entrepreneurship Skills In Tertiary Institutions, by Rahma Olamide Oladosu
With white-collar jobs becoming rare luxuries in modern-day Nigeria, emphasis has since shifted to promoting entrepreneurship, skill and talent development among the youth.
To drive socio-economic growth, and address the problem of unemployment, many economic experts are of the view that imparting requisite entrepreneurial skills, especially on the youth must start from tertiary institutions, preparatory to students’ graduation.
At the moment, entrepreneurship development is fully studied or better still, offered as a course, in most Nigerian universities. Nigerian polytechnics and Colleges of Education, CoEs, which attach great premium to boosting entrepreneurial studies, equally offer it as a course.
Nevertheless, the Tertiary Education Trust Fund, TETFund, has challenged polytechnics and CoEs, in the country to redouble their efforts in entrepreneurship and skills development.
Executive Secretary of TETFund, Prof. Suleiman Bogoro, made the call, Tuesday, in Abuja, at a capacity building workshop for heads of selected institutions and staff of TETFund Centres of Excellence.
Bogoro, who said there were indices globally associated with Centres of Excellence, especially in bringing about innovation and development, explained that the two-day event was organised to ensure proper understanding of the concept of the centres by those that will be in charge of them.
He called on the Centres of Excellence in the polytechnics to focus on skills development, entrepreneurship and start-ups even as he lamented that most of the low and medium skilled jobs in the country are being handled by people from Francophone countries.
“For the polytechnics, the centres of excellence are to focus on skills development and support entrepreneurship, start ups….
“In areas of competitive advantage and you know that skills development is central, it is fundamental. If you miss that area, if your polytechnics do not have the capacity to develop skills or the entrepreneurial ability of its students and researchers, then it has failed the nation.
“That is the area that has been very worrisome for us each time will reflect. It is very embarrassing that in Nigeria, if you go to construction sites, it has improved recently, believe me, Some ten years back, you will likely see Francophone personnel that are at construction sites more than Nigerians, that shows something is missing, but the polytechnics are trying to address it,” Bogoro said.
While saying the Centres of Excellence in the colleges of education will focus on relevant pedagogical development, the TETFund boss said beneficiary centre will get about two million dollars.
Also speaking at the event, which also had in attendance experts from the World Bank-sponsored African Centres of Excellence in universities, Executive Secretary of National Board for Technical Education (NBTE), Prof. Idris Muhammad Bugaje, commended Bogoro for his passion for institutionalization of Research and Development.
Bugaje said Bogoro’s name would be written in gold when the history of the country’s academic community is written.
He said polytechnics must wake up to their responsibility of producing skilled manpower for the country.
The NBTE boss expressed serious concern that most major infrastructure projects in the country are being dominated by skilled personnel from other countries.
“There is need for our polytechnics to be focused on skills training, that is why we say from 2023, NBTE shall never go for the accreditation of any polytechnic where there is not a single skills training centre,” Bugaje said.
Recall that TETFund had recently established Centres of Excellence in six polytechnics and six colleges of education.
The beneficiary institutions selected equally from each of the six geo-political zones in the country are; Federal Polytechnic Nasarawa, Nasarawa State; Federal College of Education, Pankshin, Plateau State (North Central), Federal Polytechnic, Bauchi, Bauchi State, Federal College Education, Yola, Adamawa State, (North East), Federal Polytechnic, Kaduna, Kaduna State, Federal College of Education, Zaria, Kaduna State (North-West).
The South-East has Federal Polytechnic, Nekede, Imo State and the Alvan Ikoku Federal College of Education, Owerri, Imo State. The South-South’s beneficiaries include Federal Polytechnic, Auchi, Edo State and Federal College of Education (Technical), Omoku, Rivers State.
Yaba College of Technology, Lagos and Adeyemi College Education, Ondo State made the list from the South-West.
At a time insecurity is ravaging Nigeria, critical stakeholders must continue to do everything possible to address youth unemployment, one of the factors aggravating the country’s security challenges.
That is why TETFund’s charge to our polytechnics and CoEs, to ‘aggressively’ boost entrepreneurship and skills development, could not have come at a better time.
Rahma Olamide Oladosu is a Staff Writer with the Economic Confidential
