Certificate Issuing Institutions? Where is the Place of Innovation in Africa's Educational Systems?

 One of the notable topics I debated during my high school, is one worth revisiting now and not later. 

Yes, the African educational systems need to be revisited with microscopes as it were; a scientist looking out for a bacteria or an atom. Let me tell you what the debate motion was - 'Ghana's education is majorly knowledge-based not skills oriented'. I am not going to tell you what my stance was on the topic because your genuine opinion is cherished. 

There is a problem if we have an educational system that does not even capture the African contexts and the very problems society faces. Wait, don't get me wrong, education remains in my opinion a potent tool for reshaping and developing society. In essence, going to school to acquire knowledge is awesome. But yes, we acquiring knowledge that remains knowledge in our heads without real manifestation in helping the real world is what I find problematic. 

My Perspective

I am one of the lucky ones from my community to break the ceiling of dreaming of education as far as high school; I went to university. And yes, I was in classes with a lot of smart minds, from different backgrounds and with different perspectives of the problems they find in their communities. Frankly, the practical part of my education was thought abstract; as a student, I only imagined everything. Coming to talking about examinations, we mainly read and reproduced abstracts. I still remember having to queue only to be cut off from observing the results of blue and red litmus papers in acid and alkaline. Like many other practical parts of my subjects, most of us took the notes we had hook line sinker. Fortunately for me, my undergraduate studies allowed for appreciable real-world experiences of the different phenomena we had treated in my public relations and advertising classes. I had made efforts to sign up for different voluntary and internship roles during the long vacations in the first year, second and third year. I must say that I was conscious about gaining some experience and putting my knowledge to work.

After school, what do I see? Out of the university, we all smoothly settled into different organizations- some related to our academic backgrounds and others not for our mandatory national service. Whatever the case for each of us as fresh graduates, we at least had a year-long work experience. Yes, we wanted work experience, not to start ones for ourselves and others around us. Are we able to create something? Yes (like you're thinking right?). Yet we had been educated to see 'white-collar' jobs as ideal. And come to think of it; why did we not start early on - during our undergraduate studies? Like many others before us, we have certificates with less empowerment to solve anything. And I wonder if we simply have 'certificates issuing institutions' not transformational ones.

Knowledge-based not skills-oriented

Too often, I have had issues with the difference created between technical institutions and universities. If the goal of education is to equip young people with skills and knowledge to build economies and societies, why are we investing in the latter more than the very skills for job creation and solutions to existing problems in our communities? Yet with soaring figures of unemployment witnessed on the African continent. How heart-aching it is to see the testament of our poor educational system - 'Association of Unemployed Graduates'. Also to think that we mostly consider technical and vocational students as 'less brilliant'; well, in the real world, they are the employers and problem solvers, though they are rather few.

I have concerns: why do we have to sit and do theory for three and four years without inculcating hands-on skills to create jobs as the graduates come out of the various institutions both at secondary and tertiary levels? Why should we be simply theoretical in our education curricula? Personally, I think like many of my classmates who are still jobless two years after our graduation; practical skills, technical and vocational skills should be tailored to formal education. A hybrid of both is the beginning of innovations and solutions to problems we have in communities. Establishing facilities that harness and grow skills for different programs of study is a step in the right direction. 

Lately, I notice a call for more job creators than seekers among young people. Laudable! But where do we start from? Your guess is as good as mine, from high schools and colleges. Let us start the agenda right. Teach young people to create and not expect to be employed. A bright future for our country, continent, and world lies with empowered young people who are not simply able to imagine but those who can move ideas to solutions. No more should we put 'book knowledge' in young minds, rather, let's equip them with both the know-how and the skills to create answers to our challenges. Otherwise, we add to the increasing problems with our educational systems. 

It's not late to rebuild the future correctly, starting from our classrooms.

Image credit: Stefano Raimondi, pinterest.com