The newest professor and youngest in the Department of Computer Engineering at Obafemi Awolowo University (OAU), Prof. Segun Aina has underscored the importance of undertaking result-oriented research that addresses a local need as well as bridging the gap between theory and practice. Pronounced a professor at 39, Aina has undertaken giant strides in his field and has affirmed his commitment to fostering development not only in academia but in the nation. TAYO ALHASSAN (OAU) reports.
Research imperative to solving local problems
In terms of research, for me, it is centred around solving local problems. I think there’s a lot we can do. Every piece of innovation that we all use, to all the appliances that you have in your house, typically originated from one of two places, either a research institute or academia. And it is, you know, research work that people were doing many years ago that later went on to be commercialised into the products and services that we all enjoy as technology.
Addressing non-performing research projects
I think this is a question that speaks to one of my greatest passions in this journey, which is the bridge that exists between academia and industry primarily, with government or governance being a concerned party. I think we really need to foster closer cohesion between industry and academia. At the moment, academia is working in what looks like silos. I think we need to find ways to make sure that the research that is going on in University A has some relationship or knowledge of the research that’s going on in University B. But most importantly, what is the value of that research to solving domestic problems, number one? Number two, what is the value of that research to companies A, B, and C? Rather than do the research and wait for the companies to come and snap up, can the companies come in a bit earlier and say, these are our problems. These are the things that we need solutions for, no matter how wild and outlandish these solutions are, the academia can say you know what, let’s play with this. Let’s try and run with this and come up with one or two solutions that may or may not be able to help. And in the process of doing that, maybe we can find something that is viable for you to use. So I feel like having research on the shelf is a common problem because the way we academics work is we can just make an assumption and say, oh, if pigs could fly, then x, y, z. So that x, y, z will stay sitting on the shelf until one day we do something that can allow pigs to fly and then all of a sudden that research becomes relevant all over again. So, I mean, world over, it is common that only a portion of academic research makes it into active use in industries. This is a worldwide phenomenon, but I think in Nigeria we can do a bit better. We can do more to make sure that what comes out of the system is of more use because we certainly have more problems that need solving than other parts of the world.
Huge gap between theory and practice
I think creating forums and rooms where the people who are doing the theory, the academics, and the people who are doing the practice, the industry, are sitting together. I think industry has a place at the table from the point of curriculum review. When we are deciding what to teach our students, it should be a combination of what the subject matter experts think should form that teaching. When a computer engineering graduate comes out of school, what does industry want from a fresh graduate? What skills and what baseline knowledge do we require them to have? Industry needs to come into the academic space and come and let us know what they want from the jump, from the beginning, where we’re developing the curriculum and reviewing the curriculum, so that we can factor that in and integrate it to close that gap between theory and practice. I think there’s also a place for technical and vocational education training within many of the courses that we have in the university system to kind of provide a practical angle to the theory that has been taught. I mean, we do that with programmes and placement internships and the likes, but I think it needs to become more of a culture rather than just something we do.
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Nigeria blessed with best brains
So we have a wealth of talent here. We have the benefit of population because statistically, even if only a small fraction of us are doing well academically, that number still translates to more than many other countries can produce. So we’re sitting on a pool of talent, both a beauty and a shame to see at the same time when you see that talent get exported. But you know the Japa thing is being reversed now, people are coming back.
They’re just not talking about it as much. It’s been 10 years since I’ve been back, I don’t regret it. I’ll do it all over again if I had the same chance and you know more and more people are coming back. I tell my students this, when you go abroad, home should always be the destination.
Potential impact of digital signal processing in Nigeria’s tech space
So digital signal processing is quite a broad field of study. The part that interests me the most is image processing. And digital signals could be anything. It could be a waveform of audio, it could be a picture, it could be video, you know it could be almost any type of data that is collected with some kind of sensor or the other, but for me my primary area is in image processing.
In terms of applications there’s a myriad of applications that exist from entertainment to gaming to marketing to security applications. In terms of marketing, for example, back in the day, it used to be people who studied marketing that used to develop advertisement campaigns. But now advertisements have been developed more by psychologists than anything else. So having technology come to play a role in that really, really helps. So I’ll give you a simple example. If I were to put a digital billboard in a mall or in the streets, and I were to put a camera on there, based on the reactions of the people who are viewing the adverts, what they see next could be tailored. So being able to recognise the official expression as they go along and tailor the contents that they receive and consume based on those expressions is a simple example of how digital signal processing can be put into play. So, for example, certain brands will run different campaigns in different parts of the country. If I’m able to recognise that it’s a Hausa man, a Yoruba man, or an Igbo man who is looking or watching the adverts, then maybe I can tailor what they see next to suit them specifically.
There are a lot of security applications too in the realm of facial recognition, expression recognition, being able to monitor people’s behavioural patterns and the likes, how they walk and things like that. So there are a myriad of applications of even image processing alone, not to talk of digital signal processing, there’s applications in the medical data from ECGs. What we now know as AI, you know, started off as the recognition of patterns in data sets.
An antecedent rooted in academics
I come from a family of academics. My parents are academics. My dad is a professor as well. My mom also retired as an academic, both of them are bright scholars. I think that’s where the inspiration for academia started from.
Passion for knowledge transfer
In terms of what drives me on a continuing basis, I think while my parents were brilliant academic scholars, I find myself to be somewhat average in my scholarly ability. And I do enjoy teaching and I enjoy the transfer of knowledge. And I feel like being able to transfer knowledge to people. Somewhat average academic ability is a different type of science. I think most lecturers, most academics, and first-class students are very brilliant, but they may not necessarily always connect with the people in the middle of the class.
So I think the passion for teaching for me comes from being able to, wanting to break things down and transfer knowledge in the simplest possible manner.
Role of technology in driving economic growth and development of Nigeria
In terms of economic growth and development, I think we can kind of break that down into two tracks. How are people able to monetise and commercialise technological solutions? And again, I think the rise of that is pretty clear for us to see with the advent of new technological platforms, social media, and artificial intelligence. You know people being able to provide services that previously had to be done manually, introduction of tech means a new wave of entrepreneurs, a new wave of inventors, a new wave of skills that people can acquire to empower themselves. And I think this has a trickle-down effect. The second track is how technology in itself plays a role within the system and the economy from an institution standpoint. And now, again, with the new tax rules that are coming into place in January, we’re seeing the deployment of a huge amount of technology to analyse what people are doing, their patterns, how they’re spending, how income works for what is largely an informal banking system, being able to log all of that is through the benefit of technology. So I think it has two roles. Summary: new wave of inventors, entrepreneurs and skills markets being created for self-empowerment and also in the deployment of solutions to help manage the economy in itself.
Plans to contribute to national development, academia
OK, so I think I don’t know if it was a coincidence[that I bagged all my degrees abroad]. I think it was just God’s plan, if you will. The original plan was to do my undergraduate and maybe a master’s, but I ended up doing my undergraduate and master’s. I always knew my destination was home. So between my master’s and my PhD, I came back home to do NYSC because I didn’t want to be dealing with that much later. So I came back home for a year to do my Youth Service because I knew I would want to end up back home. And I think when you do a PhD, you have one of two main routes, either consulting or academia. And I think with the family background, academia was a bit of an obvious choice the moment I decided to commence a PhD. So I think I moved back home to live a life of impact. I didn’t want to be just a statistic or a cog in the wheel abroad. So I didn’t apply for a single job abroad the moment I finished my PhD. I knew I wanted to come back home to lecture. I didn’t want to do it in a private university because I felt my skills would best be deployed to more people and I think a public university gave me access to way more students than a private university would and I felt that those people needed my skills more.
Again, there are two universities in Nigeria, OAU and all others, as they say. So I think it was a huge honour for me to get the opportunity to lecture there. It’s one I don’t take for granted and it’s been a good time. In terms of what I intend to contribute, I’ll just continue to do my bit in the academic space and in the public sector in terms of consulting and contributing wherever it is that I can add value. I will say that apart from equipment, funding, and some other mundane things like accommodation and combined services. But if you are talking of pure talent, I think we are as talented, if not more talented here than it was abroad. I mean, in my classes abroad, I’ve had a few Chinese students who I knew were smarter than me. But even as a lecturer in Nigeria, I’ve had students in my class that I know they’re smarter than me. I’m just more experienced than them.
Challenges faced in career
I mean, in terms of challenges, funding for research is a major challenge. One of the ways that I have the opportunity to solve it is to collaborate with industry, collaborate with the private sector through some of the consulting work that I have the opportunity to do. But I must say that that is not necessarily the case for academics and funding for research is a big issue. The process of instituting change is also a big issue. For example, the process for curriculum review in the university system is a very meticulous process but meticulous also means it’s slow and while that may be okay for for many fields but for areas that have to do with technology where things are fast moving it’s important to to be able to adapt quickly, so that was another major challenge.
How I mentor, impact students
Well, I already did my bit. The university system provides for what we call advisors who are like student advisors for a particular class. You pick them up at that point.
There are many of them. Some you just help administratively.
Some you strike up a relationship with beyond that and go from there. And I think mentorship should be, I mean, you can go out and seek it, but it’s best when it’s organic. When the mentor and the mentee have similar goals, aspirations, values, it gels a lot better. And I’ve had the opportunity of, you know, contributing to the growth of quite a number of people over the last few years from part advising them to project supervision and then after project supervision you know from the day they graduate you just realise well they graduate now you are also a graduate so effectively you guys are colleagues and you just help them navigate life. Sometimes you want to try and live curiously through them and say oh if I had all these opportunities and I know what I know now these are the things that I will do and you try and you know pass on that expo to them.
I look forward to continuing to do it regardless of where things take me.
Tackling mass emigration of lecturers
OK, so I don’t envy the people who are tasked with the responsibility of governing us at the moment because it’s a really tough cookie. I understand both sides. I’m sympathetic to both sides. I think one of the obvious things, which may not necessarily be popular politically, but from an academic standpoint, we need to deregulate the education sector a little bit. It’s highly regulated and highly subsidised. But we have a situation where candidates or students are not paying what it costs to receive the education they’re receiving. It means that the system cannot finance properly the right talent to deliver that education. It also means that people are able to procure education so cheaply here and then export their talent to make much more elsewhere. So I think, again, an unpopular political opinion, but I feel like the sector should be deregulated. Universities should have more autonomy, autonomy over more parts of their curriculum, autonomy over more parts of the administration.
Let it be an open fight. Let it be known that, if you want to talk about computer engineering, go to OAU. If you want to do law, go to UNILAG. And let them be priced appropriately so a university lecturer who lives in Ife where the cost of living is a particular amount should not necessarily be earning the same amount as somebody who lives and works in Port Harcourt or Lagos that is, obviously, more expensive than Ife. But if the quality of the particular programme in Ife is better, then the price will be driven by the demand so I think that’s autonomy and that’s the deregulation.
For us to really really get going in the system we need to deregulate, we need more autonomy. It’s important.
How I intend to help the nation
Well, I mean, in any society, there will be a myriad of challenges. I think rather than point to one specifically, I mean, there are things I’m passionate about. We have a data problem in Nigeria. I’m very passionate about that. We have an industry-academia gap problem in Nigeria. I’m very passionate about that. But more generally speaking, I think I’d much rather restate my commitment and restate my availability to work with any and every stakeholder that is in a related field to solve any pressing issues for the vast majority of people. Technology, the whole purpose of technology is to make our lives easier. So in any context where life can be made easier for a vast majority of people, I will be willing to put my time, efforts, and resources into helping the stakeholders resolve any of such issues.
Product of grace
I think academics are typically unassuming people. I think my overwhelming emotion in all of this is that I’m humbled by my journey and by the opportunities that I’ve had. It’s not because I’m special. It’s not for any other reason other than God’s grace, time and chance. I mean this when I say to my students, if I, I consider myself to be an average student, can achieve many of these things, then it’s something any and everybody can do. Academia is not hard, it just requires perseverance.
So I’m really humbled and also happy at the same time that at least even if it’s a small bulb, we can put on the sector to try and get some attention to pressing issues within the sector.
