Education experts in Nigeria have called for the improvement of skills content of Technical Education, to enhance the National Diploma, ND, and Higher National Diploma, HND, programmes in Institutions.
They said this would help the graduates to use the knowledge they acquired while in school to develop the society.
At a Capacity Building Workshop organised by TETfund in Lagos, the Executive Secretary of the National Board for Technical Education, Professor Idris Bugaje stated that the awards of the National Diploma and Higher National Diploma have been running in Polytechnics without skills acquisition input.
He said; “The ND and HND we are running have gradually being conducted devoid of skills. You’re training a mechanical engineer who doesn’t know how to wield, do pipe fitting or operate simple equipment in the industry. There is need for us to go back to our Polytechnics and see what content of skills we need to add to our ND and HND programmes.
”The National Board for Technical Education, NBT, has already decided that from 2023, no polytechnics shall be visited for accreditation or any technical programmes if they do not have skills training programmes on ground.”
Professor Bugaje also stated that the introduction of skilled acquisition courses in Polytechnics would further enhance Nigeria’s Gross Domestic Products and put an end to the importation of foreign skilled labour.
”Nigerian youths across the country are being short-changed because our polytechnics are not rolling out the skills training needed by industries and that’s why we end up employing skilled labour from overseas. We need to roll out industrial skills like wielding, fabrication, pipe fitting, electrical installations, among others. This is the latent gold mine that we are not tapping in this country,” he explained.
The Chairman Board of trustees of the Tertiary Education Trust fund, TETfund, Kashim Ibrahim described the step as a welcome development at the right time when Nigeria was in dire need of skilled citizens to boost its economy.
He said; ”Skill acquisition is quite important. If we have that, we will have more and more people producing things that are not even expected of them. What we need is skill and not certificates. People should learn to do things with their hands and generate service as well as income for the nation. Everybody is talking about unemployment but with skills, the youths will be able to find their feet.”
Kashim Ibrahim was represented by Senator Ganiyu Solomon.
The Capacity Building workshop was organised to re-strategise on how to enhance skills in the Technical education as well as boost Nigeria’s economic development.
The workshop brought together education experts ranging from lecturers to Rectors from different Polytechnics in Nigeria, with the theme; ”Improving Skills Development In Nigerian Polytechnics For Economic Growth, Entrepreneurship and Social Inclusion.”
Mercy Chukwudiebere
