Basic Literacy Not Degrees
By: Nurudeen Dauda
To begin with, permit me to add my “voice” on the going debate on “good class” of “degree” as a “determining” “factor” for “success” or “survival” in life. Please come with me!
We have come all the way from the debate on BSc vs HND to the debate on “young” people for leadership to the debate on “degrees” not “Skills” and or “Skills rather than degrees” to the debate on “Alma mater” and now to “good class of degree” as the determining factor for survival and or “success” in life.
In my thought, rather than a “degree” and or a “good class “of its, what every one of us “needs” to “survive” and by extension “succeeds” is “Basic literacy” not “higher education” and or “good class of degree”. Please don’t get me wrong this does not in any way discourage one from acquiring “higher education”.
It is apt to re-state that, what everyone badly needs is Basic literacy to enable him or her “navigate” through the challenges of the 21st century and beyond. Basic literacy skills include: “reading”, “writing”, “listening”, and “speaking”. In the 21st century and beyond one needs Digital literacy also which is the ability to use “information” and “communication” technologies to “find”, “evaluate”, “create”, and “communicate”.
As a people as a country we must accept the “fact” that not all of us “need” a “university” and or “higher education”, but all of us certainly need “Basic literacy” to survive in the 21st century and beyond.
Society is a “system” which has a component part. Society should be seen as such and functions as such. There is also the principle of division of labour and specialization. For as much as society needs medical doctors, pharmacists, engineers, architectures, and lawyers etc., it also badly needs entrepreneurs, artisans, and technicians etc. As “individuals” we are “endowed” differently in “skills”, “knowledge” and “abilities”.
In my view, as parents and as a society we must be able to identify our children’s individual “differences” in terms of their skills, knowledge, and abilities in order to encourage and support them accordingly. Their identified individual “abilities” should determine whether they need “higher education” or Basic literacy in order to remain as “entrepreneurs” or “technicians” or “artisans’.
In developed economists “higher education “does not determine your “survival” or “success”. In Finland there is a grading system for its “artisans” with a “minimum wage” to each of the grades. There is a “fixed wage” for hiring the services of say grade “A” or “B” or “C and or “D” carpenters etc. The grading system determines your earnings not your “higher education”. In such a country if one is convinced that his “earnings” as carpenter grade “D” is enough to afford him a decent life desirable one does not need to be a grade “C” carpenter except for knowledge’s sake. Most people in Finland only go for “higher education” for the “sake” of knowledge acquisition.
In my suggestion, for us to get it right we must invest in “Technical education” in our Basic literacy provision in order to address our challenges of employment. It is sad to note that there are no jobs for our both non- graduates and graduates in the county. This is really a time bomb for the country? Something urgently needs to be done to address the looming danger for the country.
We dearly need a functional economy that will cater for both our non-graduates and graduates. We need a “grading” system for our “artisans” with a fixed minimum wage for each grade. We must get our economic, energy , trade, and investment policies right.
The government must be alive to its responsibility by creating the enabling environment for the growth and development of private sector investments in order to create jobs for our jobless youth in the country. Let us encourage and support self-reliance.
May God bless Nigeria!
Nurudeen writes from Kaduna, he can be reached via nurudeendauda24@gmail.com
