Reader encourages entrepreneurial, not employable mind

ATTN: Editor,

The funding of tertiary education has attracted a lot of discussions in the past few weeks, but what I believe has been left out of the debate, is how can our universities train students not only to become employable but also employers.

The fact of the matter is that our three main universities – namely University of Technology, University of the West Indies and Northern Caribbean University -have largely focused on how to put their students in a position to find jobs rather than how to create the jobs that they would desire.

Entrepreneurship and Professional Partnerships

As a graduate of one of these universities, I believe greater attention needs to be paid to entrepreneurship and the creation of professional partnerships. This is the only way that the Jamaican economy will experience real and meaningful growth – because there are just not enough entities to absorb 2,000 tertiary graduates every year.

If students and lecturers begin partnering to create products and services that would enter the Jamaican economy as a niche market, this would help our universities to become profit centres as they could also benefit from the revenues made from the selling of these products and services.

The component mentioned above must urgently be included in any discussion around tertiary education and must eventually form the basis of any debate about tertiary education, as the performance of the Jamaican economy hinges on the performance of our universities and more so the contribution of graduates.

Let creative be,

ROGER VASSELL

[email protected]

Author Profile

Administrator: ... refers to representatives of entities such as embassies, entertainment industry, creative force whose submitted work gets published on this site. Views expressed here may not necessarily represent those of the owner of this site, but are being published in the interest of the wider public. Link me here