FG to upgrade education curriculum to ensure economic growth–Minister

 Minister of State for Industry, Trade and Investment, Hajiya Aisha Abubakar, has restated Federal Government’s determination to upgrade the education curriculum as part of efforts to achieve the Economic Recovery and Growth Plan.
Abubakar said this in Abuja on Tuesday at the 13th Students Industrial Work Experience Scheme conference, organised by the Industrial Training Fund with the theme: “Actualising SIWES Mandate: Benefits to the Nation and Challenges”.
Represented by Ochapa  Ogenyi, the Director, Research and Statistic in the ministry, Abubakar said the scheme was one of the Federal Government’s cardinal programmes meant to instill skills in undergraduates.
She said: “The scheme is meant to empower our undergraduates in universities, polytechnics and Colleges of Education with the requisite knowledge in their various disciplines which at the end of the day will guarantee employability and standards.
“The government is determined to bring about economic recovery and growth by upgrading the educational curriculum through articulated process of developing young men and women in their fields of endeavours.”
She noted that although, the expectations of government had not been fully realised due to the myriad of challenges, ITF had so far nurtured the programme effectively on behalf of the Federal Government.
The minister of state advised participants at the conference to come up with a communiqué that would guide the government to come up with concrete policies that would ensure the achievement of the objective of the scheme.
Joseph Ari, the Director-General of the fund, said the challenges posed in the implementation of the scheme had affected the intentions it was meant to achieve.
Ari said some of the issues contained in the 2011 communiqué had been addressed by ITF.
He said the issues addressed included the engagement of stakeholders to sentise the public on the relevance of the scheme to national growth and development and the e-payment of SIWES allowances.
According to him, the fund also orgainsed stakeholders meeting to resolve some of the
thorny issues associated with SIWES.
Ari, however, said that not much had been achieved with regards to funding of the scheme.
He said the conference was expected to address funding challenges and resolve the issue of geometric increase in the number of courses and students involved in the scheme.
Ari also said that the scheme had succeeded in establishing a closer collaboration between institutions and industries, a factor which he said was essential for preparing young people for the labour market.
In a paper presentation, Dr Mas’udu Kazaure, the Executive Secretary, National Board for Technical Education said the scheme was a skill based training programme that exposes students of approved higher institutions to real life work situation.
The News Agency of Nigeria reports that the paper was entitled; “Job Specification and Standardisation of SIWES-Roles and Responsibilities of Supervisory Agency”.
Kazaure said the scheme was meant to enable students understand and acquire basic technical, rofessional and ethical skills required in the industrial setting of academic discipline.
He said that industrial experiences occupied a highly significant place in Technical Vocational Education and Training curriculum.
Kazaure said: “Job specification is necessary for identifying work stages required for accomplishing specified work outcome and by this, provide a good platform for undertaking industry based work training.”
He said that for effective industrial work training to be achieved, a well-defined list of performable tasks must be identified, selected, ordered and administered on the trainees.
According to him, standardisation involves establishing rules or principle that is used as basis for making judgment on an activity and outcome.
Kazaure said standardisation was a requirement for mainstreaming and
certification of educational qualification.