Varsities Talk: How state universities ruin career prospects of youths

Varsities Talk: How state universities ruin career prospects of youths By Dele Sobowale Education means the instruction of youth in certain rules of conduct by which they will be able to support themselves when they come of age.. Robert Coram, 1761-1796. (VANGUARD BOOK OF QUOTATIONS p46). IF what Robert Coram, wrote over two hundred years ago is true, and it is substantially correct, then Nigerian universities, by and large are not discharging their responsibilities to the youth. Everyday, we are confronted with the fact that our universities generally are turning out graduates who are unemployable. The answers to the question, why, are numerous, but one or two are the most prevalent. If Federal and State government-owned universities were private enterprises, most of them, as well as an increasing number of private universities should have been hurled into various courts for operating 419 outfits. They seldom deliver what they claim in their publications or at the time they are founded by the governments which establish them. Plateau State University, situated at Bokkos, can serve as an example for the infractions of virtually all the State Universities in Nigeria, as well as most Federal and private institutions. The university which had been admitting students for various courses, since its inception, and is now poised to graduate some students, has failed to obtain accreditation for any of the courses offered. Most people might consider this a minor issue; but, that is because they don’t know the implications of the statement they just read. So, let me briefly explain. First, graduating from any university, and collecting certificate for a course which had not been accredited by the National University Commission, NUC, means that all the students have received, after years of education and at great expense to themselves and parents, is a worthless piece of paper. They cannot be admitted to the National Youth Service Corps, NYSC, neither can they be considered graduates of a university. If that is not 419, perhaps a lawyer can tell me what is. Meanwhile, the inability to be admitted to NYSC service has broader implications for the unfortunate graduates. Let me quickly list a few. Life time of unemployment, or if they are fortunate, under-employment, is their lot. No major company in the oil, banking, ICT, food and beverages, conglomerates and services will ever employ them without an NYSC discharge certificate. Certainly, none quoted on the Nigerian Stock Exchange will touch them. For that matter, no large indigenous company will accept them as graduates. Any employment offered to them will be on the basis of School Certificate holders because that is the only legitimate certificate they hold. Post- graduate education is also closed to them – except in the same university which awarded the bogus undergraduate degree in the first instance. It is virtually impossible for any graduate of a university parading a degree from an institution whose courses were denied accreditation to proceed to Masters or Doctorate degree programmes in the front line universities at home and abroad. The reason is not difficult to discover. It is risky, if not inadvisable, to build a solid upper story on a shaky foundation – which is what the university education offered to youths in most of our state universities are. Most universities, especially state universities, are in this predicament because the governors who first proposed them are transient occupants of Government House. They think short-term and many of them are only interested in establishing a university in their own home town or village – as a trophy from their tenure of office. Invariably, the costing, present, short and long-term, is wrong. Too many politicians are under the very erroneous impression that having the funds to start a university is all that is needed to establish one and make a success of it. They lack everything. Nothing could be further from the truth. More than ten thousand times what was spent to establish the University of Ibadan must have been spent to operate it. - See more at: http://www.vanguardngr.com/2014/09/varsities-talk-state-universities-ruin-career-prospects-youths/#sthash.ckVtdm5K.dpuf