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The Rector, Yaba College of Technology, Lagos, Engr (Dr) Ibraheem Abdul, has charged secondary school students and applicants for the Joint Admission Matriculations Board (JAMB) entry examinations for admission into tertiary institutions in Nigeria to embrace and enroll for future sustainable skills courses rather than just get a certificate of no impact in the near future.
He said this during the presentation of overall winner prize award of the nationwide Maritime Quiz Competition, organized by Ocean Foundation to the winner, Master Uhie Pentecost, an SS II student of Babington Macaulay Junior Seminary (BMJS), Ikorodu with a laptop at the institution.
Dr. Abdul hinted that embracing skills related courses in higher institutions will empower them economically for the future with a livelihood sustenance rather than enrolling for programmes that cannot make them job creators but job seekers where there is none, with the current trend in the country.
The Rector expatiated that majority of the youths are going en-masse into the courses that will not earn them sustainable livelihood and admonished them to be more engaged in relevant untapped skills that will empower and give them sustainable livelihood.
He called on the administrators of the post primary schools on the need to embark on intensive orientation and counselling of their students towards embracing skills acquisition programmes if the education narrative is to be changed.
According to him, “Ocean Foundation is opening the eyes of students into the professions and viable skills that will enable them to have a brighter and good future economically. It is not only the government that will change the narrative of education in Nigeria but the responsibility lies on everybody”.
He counseled the students to learn, re-learn, un-learn skills and that continuous learning are the order of future sustenance of livelihood in the present dispensation.
Dr. Abdul averred that industries are looking for bright individuals that can easily adapt and endowed with technical and vocational skills. He appreciated the Ocean Foundation for impacting the students positively with its initiative programmes. This is even as wants more learning impacts.
“We must engage in learning that will positively impact and influence the youths. I charged the BMJS students and others to feel free to choose YABATECH as their institution of first choice because the College is practically the best in various courses of Technical and Vocational Education Training (TVET), in fact, the College is the first institution to embrace TVET in Nigeria”; he stated.
The President, Ocean Foundation, Hon. Olaitan Williams disclosed that the foundation’s Maritime Quiz Competition is about catching them young and to encourage the youths to have burning interest in the maritime sector.
Hon. Williams, who is the convener of the Competition explained that the quiz is also to promote girl-child education, but boy-child were allowed to participate in the quiz, and was eventually won by a boy-child.
According to her, 3,000 students across the country participated in the maritime quiz with only 100 students making it to the final stage while the quiz was won by Master Uhie Pentecost, an SS II student of Babington Macaulay Junior Seminary (BMJS), Ikorodu, Lagos.
The Convener said that the winner and his colleagues that sat for the final quiz were brought to Yabatech to meet the College Management for formal presentation of overall prize award and to implore the institution to incorporate maritime study right from its primary school curriculum.
The Principal of BMJS, Ven. Bamidele Osunyomi thanked the rector for giving them the opportunity to visit the College, and for appreciating the quiz winner with a gift of laptop.
