‘How to make Nigerian varsities future ready’

A Professor of Economic History and Development Studies, Yakubu Ochefu, has identified steps Nigeria must take to prepare its tertiary institutions for future relevance genuinely.

He said though some progress has been made over the years in the sub-sector, unfolding events in the global space have made it compelling for Nigeria to rejig and reform its university system to enable it to produce a well-rounded, and fit-for-purpose workforce for the emerging world of work.

Ochefu, who is the secretary general of the Committee of Vice-Chancellors of Nigerian Universities (CVCNU), stated this during his lecture at the 81st interdisciplinary research discourse of the Postgraduate College of the University of Ibadan (UI).

He spoke on the theme: “Rethinking the philosophy of university education in Nigeria in the era of education 4.0.”

The university teacher listed the challenges confronting the country’s university education in Nigeria to include inadequate funding, poor quality of teaching and non-teaching staff; poor remuneration, infrastructural deficit and decay, low morale of workers, poor research funding, Japa syndrome and curriculum inadequacies, but expressed hope that they could be converted to opportunities to attain greatness.

He listed the 10 most desirable soft skills as micro-credentials expected of university products to possess to become relevant in the world of work.

These, according to him, include sense-making (which is the ability to determine the deeper meaning of expression), social intelligence (the ability to connect to others for the right reasons), novel and adaptive thinking (the ability to think and solve problems), cross-cultural (ability to adapt with others), computational thinking (ability to translate and understand vast amounts of data into abstract concepts), and new-media literacy (ability to leverage on new media for persuasive communication).

Others are trans-disciplinarity (ability to understand concepts across multiple disciplines), design mindset (ability to represent and develop tasks and work processes for desired outcomes), cognitive load management (ability to filter information), and virtual collaboration (ability to work as a team).

While noting that the fourth industrial revolution has radically changed the nature and character of the ‘world of work,’ Ochefu observed that universities and academics are no longer the sole custodians of knowledge, as learning and teaching no longer have boundaries.

According to him, aside from the fact that education can now be delivered through multiple channels, new knowledge in terms of academic disciplines, specialisations, content creation, and generation are also no longer solely the products of academic institutions.
“Corporate universities, publishing houses, research centres, think tanks and non-governmental agencies are now hubs for generating new knowledge systems,” he noted.

To tackle the challenges confronting the sector, Ochefu enjoined stakeholders, private participants, parents and students, as well as host communities, among others, to do something in their respective capacities to substantially address the problems.

He said Nigerian universities would need to be competitive just like those in developed countries in their tripartite functions of teaching, research, and community service.
The CVCNU chief noted that rethinking the 21st Century university education for Nigeria, therefore, would require all stakeholders, particularly the government, to look into the mirror for truth and honest self-assessment of the situation.

He said they would see that there is already constructive disruption of the current scheme of things that would need re-orientation and repositioning for Nigerian universities to play a leading role in the fourth industrial revolution.

Ochefu, therefore, called on academics to continually encourage political leaders, who are custodians of public funds, to improve investments in the sub-sector, while also developing innovative curricula that are problem-solving-driven and relevant to the current and future needs of the labour market and the promotion of research and scholarship.

Similarly, Ochefu suggested that academic leaders should transit from mere knowledge providers to facilitators of learning, and that award of scholarships and other forms of financial assistance to staff and students should take the front burner, such that no student is denied university education on account of finances.

Ochefu, therefore, advocated multiple financial sources, as well as cost-effective and transparent allocation of such resources for universities, saying doing these would greatly help them to perform optimally.

According to him, an understanding of new ways of managing and meeting stakeholders’ expectations, creative and innovative thinking and risk management must stack high in the university’s operational repertoire.

“We must also go beyond the triple helix model of the university-industry-government relationship to include the public-(quadruple) and environment (quintuple) interactions within a knowledge economy. “

The quadruple helix model, according to him, involves using the media to carry along the public on new government policies and programmes to move the education system and economy generally forward.

Ochefu also emphasised the importance of universities having vice-chancellors with clear visions, knowledge and skills to make things happen.

On the future of Nigerian universities, the guest lecturer declared that public-private, as well as publicly traded and for-profit-making universities would emerge as new ownership models.
He also projected that the class of ‘edupreneurs’ would grow and overtake existing institutions, and significantly increase the choice of schools available across levels.

He noted that the market value for tertiary education globally is $763 billion, while the value is projected to grow yearly by 14.49 per cent.

Citing the World Bank report, which put the global student population four years ago at 220 million and projected to hit 380 million by 2030, Ochefu said Nigeria needs to be more concerned about where its university education would be in the next six years and beyond.

He said the recently introduced new core curriculum and minimum academic standards for Nigerian universities had set the tone for the journey, urging stakeholders to tighten their belts for the task.

At the discourse were vice-chancellors of UI, Prof Kayode Adebowale, and his Lead City University (LCU), Ibadan, counterpart, Prof. Kabiru Adeyemo, alongside Provost of Postgraduate College, UI, Prof. Ayodeji Ogunjuyigbe, among others.