Prime
Fresh graduates: Where are jobs and what next indeed?
Maureen Agena
What you need to know:
- Questioning own degrees. There must be a deliberate effort to transform post-school education with trainings that emphasise skills and competencies as opposed to educational certificates. Only then shall we stop seeing university graduates questioning their own degrees.
February started with a bang. As primary and high school students returned to their schools for the start of the term and new academic year, a group of Makerere University alumni and recent graduates, reportedly on an advocacy drive, held placards in the capital Kampala, with big words inscribed on them “What next?”.
The event kicked up debate on the future of the thousands of fresh graduates.
On January 11, a total of 1,513 students graduated from 47 different academic programmes at Gulu University during their 15th graduation ceremony. Two days later, the week starting January 14 through to January 17 January, a whopping 13,509 graduated from Makerere University during the university’s 70th graduation ceremony.
These two graduations came after a number of several others that happened towards the end of last year at Muni, Uganda Martyrs, Uganda Christian and Lira universities, among others.
The excitement that comes with graduation, especially for the first degree, is palpable. Besides the graduate, the family, including parents/guardians, friends and even neighbours, are happy to celebrate with you the long journey through education.
For many, the gown is the symbol of accomplishment, it is proof that you have earned the degree and that the fruits of your hard labour and the sacrifices made, to not only keep you in school, but also see you through school to the very end, have finally paid off. For the first couple of weeks after the graduation, everyone is patient with you and sympathetic that you are finally taking a break from the burden of school.
However, a couple of months later, reality starts to kick in. Random people start to ask what course you took while you were at university, whether you now had a job and where? Whether you already secured something to do like an internship as you look for a ‘real’ job and many more valid, but extremely annoying questions.
This transition from school to the real world day-to-day realities is usually received with shock, anxiety or excitement depending on how your prior expectations.
What many people witnessed on Monday, February 3, in parts of Kampala, was part of that transition. So what is the real problem? Because there is definitely a problem.
Uganda’ vision is to have ‘A Transformed Ugandan Society from a Peasant to a Modern and Prosperous Country within 30 years’. The vision acknowledges the need to have a major policy shift in the development of the industrial sector and investment in human capital in Uganda.
I must admit that in terms of human capital, the government of Uganda has done quite a lot in increasing access to education across the entire value chain. But does the quality of the education meet the labour demands of the economy? Moreover, Vision 2040 has prioritised human capital development and the establishment of world class universities as one of the enabling factors for development.
To sustainably respond to this challenge, Uganda needs to develop home-based and market-driven training capacity and infrastructure.
Locally based high quality academic training opportunities allow for strengthening and further enhancing the capacity of universities in the country and region, provides students with courses and learning systems that are relevant to African realities, provide the students with the experience and exposure that will enable them to work more effectively with local stakeholders as job creators and seekers’ in all disciplines.
This is especially true in areas where Uganda has a comparative advantage such as agriculture, but also cross-cutting disciplines such as ICTs, to harness all aspects of the fourth industrial revolution.
There must be a deliberate effort to transform post-school education with trainings that emphasise skills and competencies as opposed to educational certificates. Only then shall we stop seeing university graduates questioning their own degrees.
Ms Agena is a communications and advocacy specialist – Regional Universities Forum for Capacity Building in Agriculture (RUFORUM).
@maureenagena
