The Nigerian Economic Summit Group has extended invitation to Mr Elvis Boniface, the Executive Director at Edu Revamp Africa Foundation and Publisher of Edugist, a blog that reports on education issues across the country.
This summit, which will be attended by seasoned academics and movers and shakers in the academic world, is aimed at deliberating significant challenges in the education sector.
Elvis Boniface and other invited scholars will be examining the critical nexus between industry government and academia in shaping demand-led tertiary education, national skills acquisition and entrepreneurship.
As the population of Nigeria continues its upward trajectory, the nation continues to experience endemic challenge of labour assimilation as manifested in mounting unemployment and poverty rates.
Skills gap among school leavers and graduates has become a major cause of youth unemployment in Nigeria, as the country’s education system does not provide adequate training in skills fit for productive work. In addition, the education curricula in tertiary institutions do not focus on prospective skills for youth employment, resulting in the misalignment of skills taught in the universities with the demand of the labour market.
In a parallel engagement, modern economies require a skilled workforce, high levels of productivity and innovation, in order to be competitive. An effective education system is a pre-requisite for achieving those outcomes. There are however significant challenges in the Nigerian education system, which has contributed to critical skill shortages and high unemployment levels.
While several attempts have been made in the past to reform the Nigerian University System, many of these interventions have failed to deliver on their set objectives. This is because they were detached from the reality of the economy for which institutions produce manpower and often with a near total focus on increased funding as a cure all for everything plaguing the system. What may have been lacking is a well- articulated framework that creates critical alignment between industry and academia thereby ensuring effective transition from education to the labour market.
It is therefore against this background that the Nigerian Economic Summit Group (NESG) and the National Universities Commission (NUC) organised a Policy Dialogue convening critical stakeholders to a special interactive session between Academia, the Public Sector and Organized Private Sector. The theme for this Policy Dialogue is “Making Higher Education Work for Nigeria” and the objective is to underscore the vital link between Education and Employment that drives economic growth and development.
The Session will examine the critical nexus between Industry, Government and Academia in shaping demand-led Tertiary Education, National Skills Acquisition and Entrepreneurship that prepares the population to be productive and competitive in the Global Jobs Market with expected far-reaching implications on Nigerian Industry Competitiveness and sustainable economic growth and development.
This submit holds today at Chartered Institute of Bankers, Nigeria, Adeola Hopewell Street, Victoria Island, Lagos.
