I have repeatedly seen arguments about the uselessness of getting a university education.
This seems even more highlighted in Nigeria with the worrisome rate of unemployment and underemployment.

This high rate of unemployment is something that we need to think about. Yes, the most popular case is that the available jobs aren’t sufficient for the population who require the jobs, but there is a flip side to this.
There are also some opportunities without competent hands to take them.

As an employer of labor, one of the most painful parts of entrepreneurship is staffing. It is even more painful in Nigeria, as you need to go through the rubble of unqualified and incompetent people to find the few that you can work with to meet your requirements. It’s usually a thing of celebration when we find perfect fits without doing so much.

In other words, the reason why unemployment and underemployment are so high is in two parts:

1. The Nigerian economy is not robust enough to create enough opportunities for entrepreneurs and their businesses.

2. The Nigerian education system is time-wasting and is not producing enough quality and competent hands who are capable of taking some of the few opportunities available.

Even if we solve 1 above, it leaves our entrepreneurs with more problems. Besides, one of the ways to solve 1 is to solve 2. It is expected that the more competent hands we have within the economy, the more creativity we can have. More creativity will naturally lead to more productivity.

When we think about the academic system in Nigeria, it is truly disturbing.
A young secondary school leaver struggles to get into one of the few available universities. This process is even more painful when such a candidate is unable to afford the fees in private universities.

Assuming everything goes well, the candidate finally gets into a public school and now has to navigate the turbulent waters of the ASUU strike, angry lecturers who are also products of this same inefficient system, internal school issues, and other things that further extend the time required to be in school.

This candidate finally makes it through this life-changing experience and then has to go through compulsory one-year service in the country.

After doing all these and sacrificing through the years, the average candidate realizes that he/she does not fit into the job market and all that was learned in school may not count for much.
Not only this, most candidates would have spent most of their 20s in the university system, only to realize that there is an unrealistic age limit expectation in the Nigerian job market.

Such a candidate will now have to pick up market-ready skills before being able to make a living.

And this is where most arguments against university education come from.
So we often ask, why spend all those years trying to achieve what isn’t relevant? Why waste so much time and resources doing the things that won’t count?

Why are we not teaching these same skills in our universities? And if we have concluded that the Nigerian university system is not built for such, why are we not creating other avenues for these skills to be acquired while working to get a university degree?

I know that we need to review Nigerian academic curriculums at all levels, they have to be more job-specific and market-oriented. And this is something that should happen more frequently.
Why this isn’t happening at all or frequently is also a pointer to how the entire system may be failing.

The argument against the current university education structure is that a person who completed secondary education and proceeds to learn carpentry, plumbing, tiling, painting, bakery, or any other market-ready skill will do much better financially than a person who spends the same time in the university trying to get a university degree.

It’s even more painful when such university graduates now have to return to learn these same skills to be able to make a living.

Every side of this argument seems valid and requires adequate consideration, this is how I think we can arrive at a solution that works specifically for our country. University degrees are meant to give leverage. They are meant to open wider doors and create better opportunities. Skills are market-ready tools that can be exchanged for profit. In a working system, these two should not be options, they should be built into a single educational system.

What this does is that it guarantees the level of quality and competence in the system.
As we’ve seen, most artisans do poor jobs. They often meet the need but the quality of the job is often not good enough. Auto mechanics, electricians, painters, tiles, tailors, etc. We all have one experience or the other where we have received very poor jobs in exchange for our money.

Yet, a young graduate of mechanical engineering is unable to do and sometimes even understand what the auto mechanic on the roadside can do.

What we have seen, however, is that a very good baker will get into the market very quickly, but a smart degree holder who goes into the same field, in the long run, is expected to do business at a larger scale, with more sophistication, and most likely will “hire” that very good baker without an education. This is where the leverage I spoke about earlier comes in.

As someone who has been on both sides of the aisle, at one point, having skills and certifications without a university degree, and later having all, I can tell you that the differences are miles apart, even in the field of information technology.

What I think we should do in Nigeria is this:

Nigeria should have well-structured, professional vocational training institutions (carpentry, furniture, plumbing, tiling, coding, hairdressing, fashion, baking, etc) that offer standardized programs. We can decide and frequently review these programs based on specific requirements within our market.

These vocational training institutions could either be approved to award certificates that are equivalent to university degrees or done such that graduates from these institutions could do a one-year top-up in any university of choice to get a degree.

This way, we can kill two birds with one stone.

Also, this way, those who want to go to the university directly can do so, while those who want to focus more on specific skills can do so while learning everything else required to compete globally.

Germany already implemented this, popularly called the “Dual System”, so we have a working example that we can follow.

If you are a young person reading this, please be encouraged to do all you can to go to the university. And while you’re doing that, kindly pick up market-ready skills that you can exchange for money.

Until we have a system that is custom-built for us, something that works for our specific needs, young people will have to continue to do more to secure their future.

O.O