National Vocational Qualification for the Under-Privileged

In Nigeria, there is a huge population of unemployed youths both educated and non-educated. This has fuelled a lot of problems in society. The present terrorism and banditry in the country have left a huge number of orphaned children as well as widows. In addition, there is a population of street beggars called “Almajiris” that has contributed to this problem. From the Internet, it is estimated that there are 17.5 million orphans, 10 million street children, and 3.5 million widows. This has fuelled the current terrorism in Nigeria as they act as a source of cheap personnel to be hired by insurgents and terrorists for various crimes such as suicide bombing and kidnapping for ransom. Creating an avenue of seriously engaging them will drastically improve their quality of life and also help in solving some of the teething problems associated with their earlier way of life. These classes of people are the ready source of the workforce for terrorist organizations. Many of them are recruited and used for fighting and suicide bombing. Many of them have been arrested with bombs stropped and just 4 dollars paid to them in their pockets. Moving this class of people from the streets is what this proposal targets. 

Various needs are met. The primary need is education. Many orphans and street children in Nigeria are uneducated and this is more so as we get to the north of the country as some traditional beliefs here discourage women from going to school. The need is to reduce poverty among these classes of people as well as some unemployed graduates. Most of the people in this group are extremely poor and cannot earn a Dollar per day. Most resort to begging. Poor as they are, many of the women have three to five children which also means that they are also prostituting with other very poor men who cannot give them anything meaningful. To reduce this poverty they need to be educated and then trained on a vital skill which is best provided by a vocations qualifications framework for uneducated people. This will help them to own businesses of their own, particularly if they can be aided with little funding. The other needs are improved health and wellbeing as the condition these women find themselves in could lead to deadly diseases that can lead to early death. The other aspect is to reduce inequality in society. Many people are extremely rich in the society where many are extremely poor and cannot afford a meal per day. These are the targets of this project. 

My business is a School with crèche, nursery, primary and secondary schools with a Centre for Vocational Education and Training for orphaned and street children. The crèche, nursery, and primary and secondary schools have children who pay some fees while others do not pay. Those who pay are those who can afford it because their parents are alive. That is how the business makes money. Then there is the second arm of pupils and students who are orphans and street children. These do not have any means of livelihood. They are there to study for free. They are allowed to study so that they can get the basic education to read and write so that they can understand the trainers in the vocational centers. This is because if they do not understand English, training them becomes difficult as they will understand their instructors who use it as the medium for instruction. Currently, we have 149 orphans and more than half of them are girls. We have to bring in widows when we get enough money to do that. The idea is to be able to educate the orphans and widows and street children to the level they can understand instructions from their trainers. With the money we get from those who pay, we are able to meet all our business costs including the payment of salaries of staff. This also helps us to feed the orphans. The other model will come up when we begin to really do other vocational subjects such as soap making, baking, tailoring, auto mechanics, and a host of other trades. This will help to generate money as their products and services will be market-oriented.  

The people we are targeting get less than 1 dollar a month! Our major targets are poor relatives of parents who are dead and cannot send their children to our school. The others are the orphans that we get from the streets and internally displaced persons (IDP) campus and some living with relatives. We hope that soon we will also approach the local and state governments to bring in the street beggars. These street beggars are all over the country but they will need proper documentation before they can be brought in. The other people that will be our customers are orphans, particularly those that have been orphaned by violence. The last group we want to be our beneficiaries are unemployed youths who want to pass long-life-learning under us to be taught new vocational skills. All these classes of people are being hired by terrorist groups because they have no means of livelihood. Some have died as suicide bombers while others were caught strapping a suicide bomb on their back with only 2 dollars equivalent given to them to carry out the dastardly act.  

I am serving in my community and as such I know their needs. My utmost success is to see my Centre for the Under-privileged persons grow into a Polytechnic of Entrepreneurship. I coordinated a World Bank-assisted Education Project for Nigeria under the Federal Ministries of Education and Science and Technology. That opened up a lot of ideas for me that can solve a lot of challenging problems in the nation. It can solve problems for the uneducated and the unemployed educated population. Under that Project, we developed a sub-project called the National Vocations Qualifications Framework (NVQF) after the International Labor Organization (ILO) model for the illiterate population.  We also set up a Centre of Excellence for Vocational Education and Training (VET) using the models of the State University of New York (SUNY) and the Korean Institute for Vocational Education and Training (KRIVET). Those are my target for my Grace Ville Schools/Centre for Creativity and Leadership.

 We are partnering with a University close to the Centre - just 65 Kilometers away. The Centre of Excellence at the University of Nigeria is our main collaborator. The Centre of Excellence has collaborations with the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organizations (UNESCO) and other Institutes such as The World Academy of Science, Trieste, Italy, all on Vocational Education and Training related issues. The second people that will collaborate with us are the local governments in Nigeria. In Northern Nigeria, the issue of street children gives a headache to all state governments. In 2020, a state in the Middle Belt of Nigeria, called Nasarawa State repatriated 556,000 street children who are beggars from his State. His was seriously criticized as all the states they were taken to refuse to accept them. Thus, the Government is looking for a Centre like ours where these groups of children can be helped. Apart from these street children, there are internally displaced persons (IDP) camps as a result of the insurgency in Nigeria with many orphans and widows. Preliminary investigation shows that these IDP camps are very willing to partner with use if their people could have trades they can learn. Our Centre is very hand for this, with only lack of finance as our major weakness. Thus various governments are very willing to partner with us on the issue of orphaned children and widows. At the Federal level, the Government is confused about what to do with unemployed youths. There are over 15 million unemployed youths in Nigeria and this figure is growing yearly as many youths live in school and they cannot find any means of livelihood. Our Centre for creativity is an ideal place for them to learn new trades. We even plan to give such individuals small loans that can help them to have their own start-up businesses. The Federal Government is thus very willing to partner with us. The other organization that is willing to partner with us is the National Directorate of Employment (NDE). This agency has the responsibility of employment for youth.

The first among these is funding. I am from a part of the world where getting funding from inside and outside the country is difficult. Thus the rate at which I thought the business would grow has not been so. Apart from poor funding is the lack of adequate equipment for vocational training which is many and expensive. This, thus, is also with the lack of funds. The other problem is low market strategies which we hope to work on when all the courses have fully taken off. The other challenge is the dwindling value of the Nigerian Naira. This has affected the price of everything in the market. The other one is unstable Government policies which make it difficult for people to plan ahead. There are changes in tax rates and even in the price of some commodities such as fuel for school vehicles, payment for energy, and a host of other things.

There are not such schools and training centers yet in the country but many people displaced by terrorism, banditry, and other acts of violence are being supported with little funds to either go to school or use it to start a living. Of course, the funds will never be enough since they are given just a few dollars. The difference in our case is that we train the orphans, and street children in the primary and secondary schools first for ease of instruction. With some level of education to enable them to read and write, we then move them to the Creative Centre where they learn various vocational skills. In Nigeria, there are a few agencies that give people money to start any business they like. For your own, you can only start a business that you are trained for. The teachers in the school and instructors in the vocational section are the real mentors of these people, unlike others that have separate mentors. Even before the issue of terrorism, there are very many street children that have caused a lot of headaches for various states. Many of the street children who beg are a big nuisance to the government and thus the government has been looking for away. My program gives the government to have a sigh of relief. While many institutions target those that have some level of education for admission, we target those who have never been to any school. As I mentioned I am planning that the environment will be converted to a Polytechnic Institute such that they can come out not only with necessary skills but also with a certificate that can be used anywhere.

As I mentioned earlier, in the next one year we will be focussing on what I learnt from the Coordination of a World Bank-assisted Project. The need for this type of program cannot be over-emphasized. At the onset of our Program, we had in mind scaling-up processes. The Founder of this Business Enterprise had coordinated a World Bank-assisted Project in Nigeria under which a framework was developed for the illiterate population. This framework was done in consultation with the International Labor Organization (ILO). Thus various occupational standards and frameworks were developed for carpentry, plumbing, shoemaking, bread baking, cake making, auto mechanics,   panel beating, and a host of other trades. This is what this Centre for Creativity and Leadership wants to develop into.

The second aspect of what we did under the World Bank-assisted Project was what was called the Centre of Excellence in Vocational and Technical Education (VTE). This was done in conjunction with the Korean Institute for Vocational Education and Training (KRIVET). In fact, my team then was trained at KRIVET for two weeks and signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with them. The proposal proper was written after the pattern of a program of Technical Education at the State University of New York at Oswego (SUNY). At Oswego, there are mobile classrooms that move from place to place for training. We purchased 5 mobile classrooms for the Centre we developed at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka. This is what we are aiming to replicate in our Centre for Creativity and Leadership.  This is what we are aiming to replicate in our Centre for Creativity and Leadership. At its peak, we will try to develop it into a University of Entrepreneurship where all the people in the market can come and practice their trades, and we will have lots of products to market. They in turn will be paid like University staff and students will be hired and trained on various skills. We will not in any way depend on any qualifications for our admission since we will have charity work at the back of our minds and uneducated orphans, widows, and street children will have to be recruited along with the educated groups. These are our plans for expansion. By the next five years, we should be able to grow into a Polytechnic Institute.       

There are various ways of measuring the impact of these innovations. The first is the number of trainees that are being graduated every year. That could be taken as an intermediate indicator. The real indicator is those that have been able to settle down with businesses on their own. To achieve this, a monitoring and evaluation officer will have to be attached to them. The second indicator is the number of collaborations formed. Currently, we only have collaboration with the University of Nigeria, Nsukka. This is because they have both the personnel and the facilities in the area of technical vocational education and training. The other collaborations that we will have in the near future are the traditional rulers that we are able to collaborate with it. In Nigeria, there are 350 ethnic groups with their own traditional rulers and their cabinet chiefs. Many of the street beggars are in their custody. The other groups are the local government chairmen and their local councils. Entering into collaboration with them can be a good indicator as they are responsible for solving most of the difficulties are the grassroots. For instance, they are the first port of call when there are insecurity threats at the village levels. The second aspect to be measured is the collaborations with State Governments who are in charge of the 36 states in Nigeria.  Unemployment and the problems of street beggars are a problem for most states. And the other issue of collaboration with the Federal Government and its agencies. In dealing with the Federal Government many of her agencies such as the National Directorate of Employment and Ministry of Women Affairs will be targeted. When the Centre grows into a University, the key processes are many. For instance, the number of Faculties, Departments, and Programs will be counted as key indicators.  The following courses are being pursued.

 1.    Programs in Home Economics

a.     Fashion Design and Clothing Management

b.     Hairdressing and Beauty

c.      Interior Design

c.      Toy Design and Production

d.     Catering and Hotel management

e.     Tourism and Hospitality Management

f.      Confectionary and Snack Production

2.     Programs in Industrial Technology Education

a.     Electrical Installation

b.     Auto Mechanics

c.      Welding and Metal Fabrication

d.     Cabinet Making

e.     Wood Turning/Carving

f.      Block/Bricklaying and Concreting

3.     Farmers’ Skill Improvement Programs

4.     Business and Office Practice Skill Programs

5.     Information Communication Technology Skills Acquisition Programs

6.     Fine and Applied Art Programs

a.     Textile Design

b.     Sculpture

c.      Painting

d.     Ceramics

e.     Graphics

II.     Technical Vocational Teachers’ Professional Development Program

III.    Networking, Information Dissemination, and Data Management on TVET

IV.    Research and Product/Systems Development

V.     Consultancy Services

The Centre runs training and retraining programs for youths, women, pre-retiring staff, and adults in different areas and skills.

In summary, the following will be the greatest measures of our outcome indicators. Measurement of activities will be through the number of “graduates” better-called trainees that comes out of our Centre yearly as the intermediate indicators. Some of the final indicators will include the number of people that have their business startups. Other final indicators will include the number of local governments we have reached to form collaborations and affiliations with which could local governments, state governments, and even the Federal Government and its agencies and parastatals. Such agencies and parastatals will include, the National Direct foe Employment (NDE), Small and Medium Scale Enterprises.

We are looking for a change whereby people will not be divided by race or religion or education. The major change we want to bring in is a Polytechnic where anyone that can pay, or is not able to pay can be admitted. Apart from this, we want to have University that does not depend on any qualification before entry but the products will be ranked the same. An Entrepreneurial University will produce goods and services that can be used to raise funds that can keep the University running. This Polytechnic Institute will be geared to problem-solving.  There are already technical teachers that are not very grounded. Granting that these technical teachers have not had formal continuing professional education instituted for them, the performance improvements would be observed in the forms of improved course designs, use of modern instructional methods/techniques such as mechatronics, machine learning, and Internet of Things (IoT); better classroom management, and use of online/virtual instructional approaches. These training efforts would translate to having more knowledgeable technical teachers, a better learning environment,  providing instructional materials, and availing competent professionals and non-professionals the opportunity and programs to train as teachers. There will also be the development of a framework for a skills map in Nigeria based on which vocational-technical programs would be developed and implemented. We also want to develop novel technical teacher education programs that are flexible and attractive to skilled professionals who desire career mobility and life-long learning. This University will target the technical and managerial skills needs of the informal sector of the economy. It will aim at developing prototypes of instructional materials needed for implementing informal, non-formal, and formal Technical Vocal Education and Training and continuing professional education programs and life-long learning.

Specifically, the following innovation(s) will be introduced:

• Establishing a mandatory 3-yearly National Professional Education for Technical Teachers (NPETT)
• Developing a novel technical teacher education program targeting skilled professionals desiring a career change.
• Intervening on technical retraining and managerial needs of artisans in the informal sector of the economy.
• Establishing programs for research geared towards generating scientifically based knowledge, dissemination, professional and curriculum development, and technical assistance to improve vocational and technical education (CTE) in the West African Sub-Region.
• Teach technical teachers how to develop and implement the online course.
• Use online courses to enable students in Nigeria TVET programs to earn credits from overseas universities and have lecturers in overseas universities teach online courses in Nigeria.
• Use Diasporas to facilitate summer retraining programs for TVET teachers.

We actually do not have any technology that powers our solution. We combine various technologies as various trades are involved. We hope to deploy mechatronics and machine learning when it comes to auto repair and panel beating. We will use blockchain and the Internet of things (IoT) in other areas. We hope to grow in terms of the deployment of technology as new areas of disruptive technologies evolve. 

We include all races, religions, and the disbaled. We do not discrimnate. In fact, we want to also eliminate the disparity in terms of educated and non-educated when it comes to admission. That is one of our theories of change. 

The business is a family non-profit outfit aimed at helping the poor. The main revenue for setting up this business came from my pocket after I won the Nigerian Prize for Science. When I won a Prize for my research on snail mucin, I decided to invest the money of setting up a center that will like to help the poor. The major customer bases are owners and importers of cars and computers. In fact, the participants are in, most cases not able to meet up the demands of the customers as many of these cars are brought in for repairs. The products are actually the cars that are repaired. Money comes out of this and is plunged back into the business as feeding for the participants and purchase of paints and spare parts for the vehicles. There are others who are involved in soap making. In fact, the list is endless. All these will bring funds in the near future but those being trained have to be perfected before their products can be sent to the market. 

Most of our products are market-oriented. When we are full-grown, particularly when we have developed into a Polytechnic Institute, we hope to have a Consultancy Unit that will develop various market strategies. As mentioned above, some of the things we are working on now will be expanded and put into the market. Governments at various levels will look for us and we hope to charge them some money. The Federal Government will look for us and even those at the State and Local Government levels will also look for us. Apart from this, many West African governments will look for our training and our products. Thus the planned sources of sustenance are many.   

In the next three years, I am interested in running a massive Polytechnic Institute dealing with all areas of technical vocation education and other attendant skills that can be learnt by both the educated and uneducated population to flood the West African Sub-Region with all items ranging from food to wears and production of spare parts for vehicles. This will bring students from across the West African Subregion.

As mentioned above, we do market some of the things we have been producing. Many more people are also becoming aware of our existence. in 2021, alone we could not take in 135 orphans because of lack of space and facilities. We have not been able to receive grants but are still hopeful that one day we will be able to receive some grants. We are trying to reach the Nigerian Directorate of Employment to begin to partner with them. The Local Government of the city where we are is already paying attention to us. We hope that very soon Local Governments across the nation will follow suit. What we are trying to do is what the various tiers of Government have tried and failed. Thus there will soon be buy-in and then we can charge some money which will stabilize us further. Currently, our major source is from fees from those who can afford it and the products they make, and the services they give.