Degrees without skills will soon be useless – JAMB registrar hints
The Registrar of the Joint Admission and Matriculation Board, Professor Ishaq Oloyede, has urged Nigerian youths to seek demonstrable skills as a means of survival, warning that very soon university degrees would no longer be the sole guarantor in the job market.
Oloyede gave the advice on Thursday while delivering the convocation lecture at the Kwara State University, Malete.
He delivered a lecture, titled: “Learning, Unlearning and Relearning – Prerequisites of the Digital Age.”
The JAMB registrar said, “New opportunities will emerge in the high-tech sector and many skills that were not otherwise taught in conventional schools would be needed. Degrees would no longer be the sole guarantors of jobs but demonstrable skills will.
“In this regard, there won’t be meaningful difference between the literates and the illiterates without the cutting-edge skills that are associated with the triad – learning, unlearning and relearning.”
Oloyede stressed that: “Those who can learn, unlearn and relearn are the successful ones and those without the mindset that accommodates the triad are bound to perpetually lament.”
While noting that today’s world was different from the Stone Age, the JAMB registrar noted that: “One of the factors responsible for this change is the totality of what makes the information age, which is still evolving as technology develops rapidly.
“The onus of the responsibility lies on everyone to get prepared for the challenges of the information age by taking lifelong learning seriously and being willing to change as the circumstances unfold.”
The acting Vice Chancellor of KWASU, Prof. Shaykh-Luqman Jimoh, had earlier in his address expressed optimism that the lecture would broaden the horizon of the audience.
“Our educational institutions must become catalysts for transformation, preparing our graduates not just for the challenges of today, but for the rapidly evolving landscape of the digital age,” the VC said.
