Engineer Babatunde Odufuwa has urged students who are aspiring for greatness to embrace technology education.
Odufuwa who made case for qualitative education at all levels said that education is a prime mover of any modernizing society adding; "the natural resources and accumulated capital of the country will invariably remain dormant unless its human resources are adequately developed and utilised to exploit the non-human resources into consumable articles."
He maintained that in order to improve the quality of life of Nigerians, the country must tap into the global system of generation and transformation of knowledge, which will generate indigenous knowledge, diffuse and transfer information as well as utilise the knowledge in productive activities.
According to him, if Nigeria wishes to participate in the knowledge-intensive global economy, it must be able to produce large numbers of scientifically and technologically literate, innovation receptive, highly adaptable and problem solving minded people with a pre-disposition to life-long learning.
Speaking at the 7th convocation ceremony of Lagos City Polytechnic (LCP) where a total 1,226 graduands were churned out, Odufuwa who spoke on the need for students to imbibe entrepreneurship skills said that the tendency has been either to subsume the youth into the general adult population or to ignore their effort to forge a livelihood through enterprise activities saying, this has resulted in the lack of understanding of the potential benefits of youth entrepreneurship as a means of improving youth livelihood.
According to him, the Lagos City Polytechnic students have demonstrated creativity and skills by designing and building an electric-powered car via solar energy. He added that other projects of the students include; designing and conceptualizing another version of 'Facebook', paint production, academic gowns, shoes and bags.
On research, he noted that the link between research and the productive sector in Nigeria is either weak or not in existence, recommending that government and other stakeholders should retrace their footstep and go back to the basics rather than neglect and discriminate against polytechnic education, which emphasizes more practical disciplinary concepts and assures of greater adaptability and relevance.
On his part, the keynote speaker and Managing Director, Lagos State Development and Property Corporation (LSDPC), Mr. Muhammed Taofeek Oki who was represented by Mr. Babajimi Benson spoke on the theme Human Capital and National Development: The Role of Polytechnics.
He said; "Although polytechnics were modeled to be institutions where multiple skills are taught, however, for reasons ranging from underfunding, mediocrity, corruption, wrong prioritization and lack of vision, Nigerian polytechnics have lost their natural role and are now the alter egos of universities.
