Quote from Kingsley Ekekwe on September 5, 2019, 9:37 AM

When we were young, we were often told that becoming a graduate is an automatic ticket to say bye-bye to poverty.

But today, if care is not taken, becoming a graduate without graduating with CS&S (Graduating with your Creative Senses and Skill), might actually be a trap to launch one into a journey of no return to the land of poverty. And I think that my father understood this earlier as far back as my days in secondary school. Each time I am set to go back to the school hostel, his counsel to me then was “Biko Nwa m, I na-agu akwukwo biko na-agukwa uche” (which I can translate to “Please my Son, if you are studying, try as much as possible to study with wisdom”)

On the 16th of April 2019, I received an invite for an interview in a new established private Polytechnic here in Abia State, Nigeria for the position of an Assistant Lecturer.

I was privileged to come in contact with individuals with loads of degrees (HND, B.Sc., Msc, MBA, LLB, PhD in view, double Masters Degree in different fields and so many more) and some of them were sincere enough to narrate their ordeal on their long walk to job freedom of which its yet to be achieved. In some cases, they were told “…am so sorry Sir, with all these qualifications, we can’t pay you”.

And that got me thinking…what a country! With all these monies spent to acquire these certificates, is it not enough to start up a business?

Actually, for a truth, I believe that the University Education is not for everyone. To have a successful life crowned with riches and good fortune, degree certificates is not the only route to getting riches and assurance of good life.

I know today, some of my secondary school mates that are living their best lives, rich, married with kids and happy family(though pockets of issues),paying their bills and taking care of their family members and loved ones. They succeeded without a university degree. Some of them cannot even boast of a WAEC Certificates, yet they developed a good sense of reasoning, strong decision making skills, business skills and can read and write as well.

DEGREE CERTIFICATE!
**********************
I think that the best way to approach the decision to venture into the journey of University Education is to examine the passion you have for education in line with the dreams/vision you hold so dear to yourself.

Some individuals like Kevin O’ Leary; a Canadian businessman, author and television personality. He co-founded O’Leary Funds and SoftKey, with a net worth of US$400 million+, is of the opinion that the best way to think about University Education/school is as an investment, which requires huge amount of money and in some cases, one might incur debts.

To me, he has a strong point and in actual sense, that is what it is but I think that most individuals over here in Nigeria and in most African countries understood such concept the other way round.

Most youths now consider degree certificates as an investment, placing more value on the piece of paper that will be presented at the end of their degree program, while relegating the actual relevance of the knowledge embedded in-between lines of those degree certificates that signifies “YOU HAVE BEEN FOUND WORTHY IN LEARNING AND CHARACTER” to the background.

This is the major reason behind the decays we see today in all the political, economic and socio-cultural structures initiated in order to bring about a developed society.

People without knowledge, vision and character now pilot the affairs of leadership and guess what happens when a blind man is leading another blind man or possibly, a blind man leading people with sight and fails to heed to directions from the people with sight? Your guess is as good as mine.

Today, most students believe in let me invest money to get the degree certificate, whether by hook or crook, since it is an assurance of good life, hence we began to experience cases of exam malpractices, cases of sorting lecturers for upgrades in scores, female students sleeping with lecturers for grades and so many ill practices we do see today in our education system, which has actually created a ripple effects of negative outcome when it comes to sustainable development in our country today.

Education; the center piece to Development
********************************
Developing societies and scaling them up to become a unified structure that bound itself together to have a conglomerate in the name of a state or country, is a science and as well as an art that requires special trainings in various fields, ranging from many professions to career path.

And formal education backed up with consistent research and solution findings to humanity problems has helped to shape the world in positive dimensions and continues to do so. So to h*ll with individuals who says “WHO SKOOL HELP”

So, education based on personal gains is an aberration to the true tenets of education in real sense. This entails that the purpose for university education should be a two way thing-
• Personal Gains
• Service to Humanity

Other Routes to Getting RICH!
******************************
It is obvious by now that university degree is not an automatic ticket to getting rich. So I think that it’s high time we encourage and work towards a paradigm shift of mindset away from this killer disease that has crippled a lot of young people today, who carry around loads of degrees on papers without having the content of the papers they carry within.

Before one should pick a JAMB form/ or apply for higher studies in the first place, I think it is necessary that he/she should consider these options-

• Why do you want to go to university?
• Is it more of a passion to you to acquire formal education?
• Are you ready to take the risk to accept the fate of not likely to land a high paying white collar job after graduating? To venture into personal initiatives that can sustain you until you break even to live your dream life?

Having considered the above options, and you feel that it is not a road pleasant enough for you to venture into, then consider these routes-
• The Igbo Apprenticeship model of trade
• Trade
• Roofers
• Construction works
• Electrician
• Plumbing
• Welding
• Web designing
• Online wealth creation opportunities, and so many more.

Of a truth, there is so much demand for these that people often overlook and look down on them. And one can get rich there a lot faster than going through the traditional education system.

If you cannot be patient enough to carry the cross associated to becoming a graduate, and working to become the content of the certificate you carry, I suggest that you should make hay while the sun shines.

For individuals like us, we have passion for this (Education for personal gains and service to humanity), that is why we staked our life to it. Though the dividends of it might not be seen now, but I know by faith that at the end of the tunnel, definitely we will see THE LIGHT.