The National Universities Commission is planning to establish an ‘industrial attachment’ programme for university lecturers in a bid to improve the quality of graduates from the country’s universities.
It is widely believed that, in recent times, majority of the graduates produced by the country’s higher institutions are ‘unemployable.’
Deputy Executive Secretary of the NUC, Dr Suleman Yusuf, who spoke in an interview on the sidelines of a stakeholders’ forum with the academia organised by the Nigerian Communications Commission in Abuja, said there was a need for Nigerian lecturers to acquire ‘hands-on’ industry experience, similar to the sort of knowledge students gain from participating in the industrial training attachment scheme.
One of the themes of the NCC ‘Stakeholders’ Forum with the Academia’ was the production of ‘industry-ready’ graduates.
Yusuf explained that through improved collaboration with the private sector, the NUC now involved employers of labour in various industries in the review and formulation of the academic curriculum in the universities.
But Yusuf added that the NUC intended to go further by getting lecturers to undergo industrial attachments.
“We are taking concrete steps beyond curriculum review; we are looking at a situation now where lecturers themselves would be attached to industries for some short time attachment so that when they go back to the classroom, they will not be talking about theory, they will also have some hands-on experience. That is where we are going,” he said.
Yusuf observed that industrial experience was vital because some knowledge could not be obtained inside the classroom.
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