NBTE head expresses concern about the state of technical education in Nigeria

Professor Idris Bugaje, Executive Secretary of the National Board for Technical Education (NBTE), has expressed concern about the state of technical colleges in Nigeria and urged the government to increase investment in TVET.

Bugaje spoke during a workshop on strategies for implementing the Nigerian Skills Qualification Framework (NSQF) in Technical Colleges of Education (TCE), held in Abuja at the National Commission for Colleges of Education’s headquarters.

According to him, skills drive education in the world, and they have grown increasingly crucial in today’s market, necessitating the incorporation of skill development into any education that wishes to remain relevant.

He argued that in the next 20 years, university education will become insignificant unless there is a paradigm change towards skills, which is now occurring in various nations throughout the world.

While revealing the state of technical colleges in Nigeria, Bugaje stated that none of the 129 Federal Technical Colleges are worthy of accreditation.

He said that all of them failed the accreditation because they lacked trained instructors, equipment, infrastructure, and other resources.

“In one of the technical colleges visited recently, a man who was acknowledged as a store keeper in a previous visit had become the principal of the school because all the qualified people had left due to poor motivation.

“Only the National Youth Service Corp (NYSC) members and store keeper are now running the school. Since a corp member could not be made a principal, hence the option of the store keeper who failed accreditation as expected.

“We need to reinvent the TVET and technical education. We need to quickly convert some of the conventional secondary schools to technical colleges and give more budgetary allocation to TVET and if possible, create a Ministry for TVET and skills.

“The NBTE is always willing and ready to support a technical education that will herald the desired development in Nigeria,” he stated.

Bugaje of the NBTE noted that these were some of the reasons the board felt that there was the need to strengthen its collaboration with NCCE, and starting with Federal Colleges of Education (Technical) to see how skills training under the National Skills Qualification Framework could be entrenched.

“We have introduced the Mandatory Skill Qualification (MSQ) in polytechnics; at least, every student must graduate with one skill qualification of his/her choice. Four credit units have been earmarked for that spread across two semesters. No student is permitted to graduate without an MSQ certificate.

“Henceforth, polytechnics will be issuing two certificates, the diploma and the MSQ, which will enhance the employability of the graduates.“

Meanwhile, Professor Tahir Mamman, Minister of Education, stated that the implementation of the Nigerian Skills Qualification Framework (NSQF) in Colleges of Education enhances the self-reliance and employability of graduates of the institutions.

He stated that skill acquisition remained vital to lowering the nation’s unemployment rate.

Mamman, who was represented by the ministry’s director of Special Duties, Zubairu Abdullahi, expressed confidence that implementing the NSQF programme in colleges of education would benefit not only the community and the immediate environment, but would also help to train skilled NCE graduates.

He praised the NCCE for collaborating with the NBTE to expand the NSQF programme’s implementation in colleges of education.

“This initiative will surely contribute and support the Renewed Hope Agenda of President, Bola Ahmed Tinubu, in producing self-reliant graduates,” he said.

Professor Paulinus Chijioke, Executive Secretary of NCCE, stated that the commission needed to bring on board students from Colleges of Education (Technical) to provide them the opportunity to tap into the framework.

He stated that since last year, when the idea of bringing the NQSF into the College of Education (Technical) system was proposed, several measures have been carried out to ensure the program’s successful implementation.

According to him, the workshop’s goal was to familiarise the target audience, which included provosts and desk officers, with the modalities and strategies for the NQSF program’s smooth launch and implementation in technical colleges of education.

He praised the provosts for participating in the initiative and sponsoring their employees to attend the seminar, despite the evident security challenges and economic situation of the country.

According to Chijioke, the NQSF program is intended to develop, classify, and recognise the skills, knowledge, understanding, and competencies obtained by graduates of training institutions.

The framework, he added, “gives a clear statement of what learners have to do and how to do it, irrespective of whether learning occurs in a conventional classroom, on the job, or less formally.”