National Daily

Zinox, USAID empower UNILAG with digital centres

By LEKAN FADEYI

THE University of Lagos (UNILAG), Akoka, has benefited from the generosity of leading original equipment manufacturer in Nigeria, Zinox Technologies Limited and the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), digital centers and other equipments that will boost learning in the institution. The largesse jointly sponsored by USAID, British American Tobacco (BAT), Microsoft Nigeria, Ocean Energy, Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) was described as being in the interest of curricular development, capacity building and empowerment of the university students for employable positions after graduation.
The partnership funded by the donors brought into the university system 362 personal computers (PCs) for the faculty of Business Administration, and another 362 PCs for the computer science department. The cost put at about N34 million was underwritten by the donors for the benefits of the growing student population of UNILAG.

Vice Chancellor of the Institution Professor Shina Odugbemi said the donation "is a milestone in capacity building," adding that it is indeed a huge and worthy accomplishment because no government can fund education alone." Odugbemi thanked the donors for their kind gesture, adding that this should sustained.
For United States (U.S.) Ambassador to Nigeria, Ms Robins Sanders, this partnership will enable the students play a major role in Nigeria's development.
Sanders whose speech was read by American Consul General to Nigeria, Ms Donna Blair, said she was there to celebrate on behalf the U.S. government the launch of two computer laboratories in the partnership of USAID, BAT, Microsoft Nigeria, Ocean Energy, Zinox Technologies, Kansas University and UNILAG.

The Ambassador admitted that universities in developing countries face a common challenge of accessing the tremendous resources necessary to provide modern technology to their students. "Without this technology, students move on to face greater challenges: funding employment without the skills necessary to perform the jobs for which the companies are hiring". She said the U.S. government and its partners in this project recognise this difficulty and the long-term consequences of failing to address it. This was the challenge University of Lagos faced as well. "The project is to prepare today's students for gainful employment tomorrow," she explained.

The U.S. support will continue as we work with the University of Lagos, Kansas State University with funding from USAID and BAT will work to embed dialogue with private sector on their employment needs into curricular planning while simultaneously working with students to ingrain the need of Nigeria businesses to play an active role in giving back to Nigeria, just as the private sector partners have demonstrated today."

USAID Nigeria will work with the private sector partners, UNILAG students, workers and the Nigerian private sector to: align key curricular of the university with the skill demanded by the Nigerian private sector; foster a sense of obligation in tomorrow's leaders to play active role in Nigeria's development; provide valuable and challenging internships to talented, high performing students and increase employment, incomes and productivity of UNILAG graduates through strengthened technology skills.

Executive Director, Zinox Technologies, Mrs. Vivian Abii, explained that Zinox’s involvement was in response to Prof. Babs Fafunwa’s 1972 cry for the need to make available quality education to the Nigerian child. He was concerned that the curriculum did not teach the child enough about his immediate surroundings. Therefore, the child was ill-equipped to face the challenges of his environment. A school of thought in Nigeria believes that the Nigerian civil war was partly the result of the failure of the educational system in Nigeria. The clamour for a review of the educational system led to the national conference that produced new curricula for schools. That clamour seems to have resurrected with the 2003 World Bank report that classified Nigerian graduates as unemployable and the Webometrics Ranking of World Universities which does not list any Nigerian university among the first 4,000 universities."

Abii said that this background provoked Public Private Partnership that we are launching today. The University Strengthening for Improved Employability Project is an idea whose time has come. It brings extra value to the school system in the sense that it aims to identify and rectify the incongruence between the educational system and the private sector. We are not just providing computers to digitalise the processes of teaching and learning, the initiative aims ultimately at developing a curriculum that would adequately deliver the manpower needs of the private sector.

The Zinox systems, which form the bedrock of the donors were heavily discounted. "The Faculty of Business Administration and the Computer Science Department should count themselves lucky to be the pilot of this unique initiative. I urge the faculty and staff to take advantage of this opportunity not only to graduate exceptional students but also to improve the ranking of the University of Lagos. The partners have put everything in place from the computer labs to the modern lecture theatres, to the technical support from an American university to the hands-on experience promised by the partners. This initiative ideally should serve as the springboard to overhaul the educational system in Nigeria, Abii who is chief executive officer, Computerise Nigeria project, said.

Kansas State University representative, Danesi Jafar, said: "This event represents a new era and a major milestone in the history of the Faculty of Business Administration and the Department of Computer Science at the University of Lagos. An event of this magnitude does not just happen without the vision and dedication of key individuals and organisations. We are truly indebted to the USAID for looking outside the box to recognise the value of human capital development and strengthening the curriculum in business management education to contribute sustainable economic development.

"The launching of the computer labs will, no doubt, assist the Faculty of Business Administration and the Department of Computer Science in producing graduates that are highly competent in information technology. Information technology is the foundation of all modern business both locally and internationally, and because of this, the workplace clamouring for highly skilled graduates to keep pace with this constantly changing environment. To address this need, the USAID project has begun a series of discussions with the Business Faculty about new courses to teach information technology skills. We have funded four IT incentive.

"Grants which will result in new course development as well as the revision of several existing courses. We look forward to developing a required course for all business students entitled: "Information Technology in Business" and we are hopeful that this course will be offered by fall '2008 or soon after. We will also be engaging the CS Department in discussions on how the latest information technology applications can be integrated into the esteemed. CS programme. At the end of this project, FBA graduates will be sought after for their IT competence and the existence of increased computing capacity in the form of these labs is essential for producing this outcome."