The executive vice chairman/chief executive of the National Agency for Science and Engineering Infrastructure (NASENI), Professor Mohammed Sani Haruna, on Saturday asked the federal government to restructure the curriculum of the Industrial Training Fund (ITF) to be in tandem with current realities.
He said Nigeria would not continue to produce engineering, science and technology graduates without adequate hands-on.
Haruna made the submissions in a keynote speech at the Annual General Meeting of the Relevant Technology Old Students’ Association (RETOSA) in Jos.
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He said the country could catch up with the rest of the world if it returned to prioritisation of craft, technical and vocational schools and education.
He also said that Nigerians were outsourcing occupational specialisation from Togo, Cameroon, Niger Republic and other West African countries because schools did not pay attention to skills acquisition.
He said, “I hereby recommend the overhaul and redesign of the curriculum of the Industrial Training Fund (ITF) to adopt the model and method of the relevant technology for a truly practically oriented workforce.
“In reality, the current ITF is adding nothing to skills acquisition. I also call on the National Board for Technical Education (NBTE) to integrate the Relevant Technology System in the syllabus of monotechnics and polytechnics, as well as the National Skills Qualifications Framework (NSQF).”
Haruna said it was time for the country to produce science and engineering graduates who would be practical-oriented.
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