Ghana needs holistic education to prepare youth for job market - TEI

The Tebah Educational Initiative (TEI), a non-governmental organisation, has urged framers of Ghana’s education system to ensure that curriculums are designed to equip the youth holistically for the corporate world.

Mr Alexander Yanyi-Ampah, the Lead Vice President, said it was not enough for the youth to pass through the educational system, rote learn, graduate with honours, and still be unfit for the job market.

Speaking at the Ghana News Agency Tema Regional Office stakeholder engagement, a progressive media platform for state and non-state actors to contribute to national development, Mr. Yaynyi-Ampah stressed that “our educational system should be created in a way that soft skills such as good communication, corporate dressing, and time consciousness, among others, will be inculcated in the students before graduating.”

He said employers were not only interested in having a first-class or second-class upper if the graduate could not give out the maximum productivity to the company; therefore, they might prefer employing someone with a third-class but all-round background.

He said another way of providing students with efficient training was to engage industry players as lecturers instead of relying on people with big academic titles who do not have any practical experience to impart to them.

According to him, universities in Europe have lecturers who do not have doctorate degrees, are not professors, have established companies, and are successful in their fields instead of having theoretical knowledge.

“Most of the things they do in our universities are outmoded, like having an industry player as a lecturer, as pertains in the US and other European countries; with that, it’s not just the titles but the experience and expertise,” he stated.

Mr Yaynyi-Ampah also said internships must be made part of courses so students can go and acquire practical training in the field of their studies while still in school, saying the universities must ensure that the internship is aligned with the course.

He also encouraged the youth to volunteer to work in industry during their leisure time, as that would provide them with the needed experiences while still in school.

He explained that during such a volunteer programme, the students get exposed to the actual work, equipment, and industry software, among others, therefore eliminating the shock most of them face when they enter the corporate world, as most of the things they learned in school might be different from what happens on the job.