KWASU VC urges students to acquire job-enabling skills

From Frank Ikpefan, Abuja

Vice-Chancellor, Kwara State University (KWASU), Malete, Prof. Muhammed Akanbi, has said it does not make  sense for universities to produce first-class graduates without job- enabling skills.

The vice-chancellor said this when he led the management team of the institution on a working visit to some select government agencies in Abuja to mobilise support for the university.

Akanbi’s position came on the heels of the recent report by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) that about 21.7 million Nigerians are unemployed.

The International Labour Organisation (ILO) has been canvassing for suitable skill-oriented  programmes for better future of work.

Akanbi, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), said KWASU, in its effort to provide a solution to the joblessness of many youths after graduation, decided to make it a norm to produce graduates that are already engaged in one job-enabling skills/trade or the other.

He said KWASU already had a centre for entrepreneurship and would soon roll out academic programmes that ensure all its students are exposed to state-of-the-art skills in computing and at the same time understand at least one foreign language to prepare them for the 21st century’s challenges.

“Our university is a university of community development and entrepreneurship. I like the fact that you appreciate what we are doing with entrepreneurship; that centre is being rejigged and rejuvenated.

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“It is now called the centre for vocational, technical and entrepreneurship because we don’t want to teach entrepreneurship just in theory. We get our students involved in vocational things and technical aspects.

“Already, we encourage our students to engage in different entrepreneurial skills, acquire, hold and consider all certificates important. It does not make any sense if you are a first-class student and you are looking for a job. And I mean First class in any programme,” he said.

Akanbi said KWASU students are encouraged to own businesses.

“You will see students making face masks, face shields, hand sanitisers, some are into tailoring, some are into carpentry, some are into what I call mechanical automobile repair and things like that.

“And in the past, the CAC has given awards to our students because as we are talking, every year almost 2,000 students register with the CAC because when you come in, it is expected that it is not going to be only a classroom thing,” he said.