Unemployment among Technical Students: Implication for Managers of Higher Education

The problem of unemployment among youths has remained unabated. This has cast doubt on the methods of instructions by lecturers. This study takes a critical review of some of the previous studies with an emphasis on employment statistics and employability skills. The paper x-ray the basic elements of employability skills and the latest statistics of youth unemployment in Africa particularly, Nigeria. The aim is to sensitize education managers of higher institutions in Nigeria about the danger inherent in turning out graduates massively without the corresponding skills to match them adequately with the world of work. Findings show that there is a persistent rise in the rate of youth unemployment because what the schools offered is not compliant with the labour market demand. The resulting skills played a significant role in increasing unemployment among Tertiary Education graduates. Therefore, the higher education curriculum needs to be modified to reflect the skills required of employers

Entrepreneurship skills framework for fostering the employability of industrial technology students

The rising rate of youth unemployment and its attendant consequences on the general populace in Nigeria has assumed a frightening dimension. The academia and other relevant stakeholders have gradually come to realize that the possession of academic qualifications alone cannot guarantee a good quality job. Nigerian higher intuitions are now introducing entrepreneurship studies in their school curriculum without a clear framework. Research has shown that this does not guarantee total graduates unless we have an entrepreneurship skills framework that is functional and discipline-based. Noting that entrepreneurship is classified into two folds; entrepreneurship specific and entrepreneurship mindset, this study intends to develop an entrepreneurship skills framework that will promote the employability of the students of Electrical Technology in Colleges of Education in Nigeria. The survey research that employs the sequential exploratory mixed methods was used for the study. The population for this phase consists of entrepreneurs and academics in Nigeria. The use of the partial credit model in the Rasch analysis model guaranteed the consensus of the experts on each of the items being measured. The outcome of the study will contribute to the social-economic peace and sustainability in Nigeria and the body of knowledge in entrepreneurship regarding electrical technology

Competency Reskilling Model for Improved Performance of TVET and Science Workshop Managers in Higher Institutions

The existence of the workshop attendants in technical education is aimed at complementing the job of the lecturers to ensure that a well-grounded and employable graduate is produced. Over the years, the complaints about the poor quality of the output have been shifted to the lecturers teaching methods and techniques, workshops and facilities without recourse to the competencies of the workshop attendants. The focus of this study is to develop a model that will boost the technical proficiency of the personnel that is employed to work in the technical workshops and laboratories. The exploratory sequential mixed method was used for the study. 8 participants were involved in the qualitative phase of the study while the quantitative phase involved 44 respondents from among the Workshops experts and Academics. The sample for the study was selected from among the workshop attendants and academics in the 3 universities and 4 Colleges of Education in South-Western Nigeria. The validity and reliability of the instrument were achieved through subject matter experts from the Industry and Academics, and the Fleiss Kappa calculator, which gave reliability of 85.83%.  The purposive sampling technique was used for the qualitative phase. The Rasch Measurement Model was used to analyze the item in the instrument by examining the person and item separation and reliability, dimensionality, item fit statistics to determine the item that fits the model using the Partial Credit Model.  The item in the instrument was recorded an item separation of 3.32 with a reliability of .92. The model will have implications for the Universities, the technicians, the students and society

Determination of employability skills required by electrical technology students in colleges of education in Nigeria

The rate of unemployment among youths in Nigeria has assumed a worrisome dimension. More importantly that those affected are specialized graduates from tertiary institutions. The youth unemployment rate has been of persitent increase since 2014 from from 11.7% to 36.5% in 2018. It has been established that the vacancies exists, but the graduates lack the skills to match the jobs. Therefore, the aim of this paper was to identify the constructs and sub-constructs of employability skills that are needed to match Electrical Technology students with the labour market. The resaerch design is a qualitative metthod involving document analysis and interview protocol of stakeholders in electrical technology. The stakehoders were the academics and the employers. The documents were analysed using frequency matrix table. While the interview of the stakeholders (experts) were done thematically. To ensure the reliability of the constructs and sub-constructs, an item pool was constructed to determine the agreement and content reliability index for the constructs. From the item pool, 5 constructs and 193 sub-constructs were generated. These were constructed into instrument for expert review. Three experts in electrical technology rated the instrument for determining the aggreement level, using the Fleiss kappa approach. The percent agreement for the raters are 89.63%, 86.01%, and 81.86% respectively with a mean agreement of 85.83%. The 85.83% indicate an almost perfect agreement by the experts for each of the constructs in the instrument. This is very good for producing a functional framework of employability skills

Soft skills needed by electrical technology students for 21st century jobs

The study investigated the rise in the rate of unemployment among Electrical Technology graduates from Colleges of Education in Nigeria despite the huge government investment in power and education sectors. The study is a qualitative study which involve a survey of literature and interview protocol. This study is designed to determine the employability skills needed by electrical technology students in Colleges of Education qualitatively with the aimed of suggesting a departure from the general framework available to all disciplines. A review of journal articles and policy documents on Employability skills and Electrical Technology was conducted, leading to the interview data that was conducted among 6 employers of labour and 4 Senior Academic staff in the four Colleges of Education that have Electrical Technology programme in South Western Nigeria. The study revealed that there is a skill mismatch between Colleges of Education in Nigeria and the labour market. Thus, the students lack the skills for 21st-Century jobs. The two results were integrated to come up with a Framework of employability for Electrical Technology students in Colleges of Education in Nigeria. The study observed that the framework developed was still broad and therefore recommends a valid discipline-difference employability skill framework using Rasch Analysis Model to determine the competencies and its hierarchy