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Students say varsity education has little room in practical life
2008-04-02 10:40:39
By Patrick Kisembo
The educational system in the country has been blamed for failure to prepare competent graduates capable of doing practical work in a dynamic labour market.
Graduate students from various universities in the country attending the forum dubbed Students` International Forum on Entrepreneurship and Empowerment at the University of Dar es Salaam made the remarks at the weekend in the city.
``Our educational system allows a student to learn more theories than practice, which renders it difficult for the graduates to perform poorly in the labour market,`` said Wolfgang Calist.
Calist said the country`s working environment does not encourage students to practice their professional jobs.
For his part, the International Students Organization Vice President, Sylvia Ngemela, said it was absurd to find graduates performing jobs done by Standard Seven leavers.
``It`s discouraging to find degree holders in low-standard jobs. If you are a graduate, then you should secure a job that is comensurate to what you have studied,`` she said.
Ngemela said the forum was aimed at preparing graduate students to sell their expertise to their would be employers.
``We are meeting with different companies.
Students from different universities in the country are trying to discover their talents and how to develop and practice them at workplaces,`` she said.
``Most of the graduates are stranded. We decided to organise this forum to enable them sell their professional talents to companies that may be in a position to buy them,`` she said.
Ngemela said it was established previously that people who even graduated with First Class were not able to perform well once employed and it was difficult for them to learn fast while training on the job.
``That is why we have decided to run this kind of training for finalists to give them room to understand the practical side of the job they will be performing,`` she explained.
Mark Lyimo, Deputy Manager Reliance Insurance Company (T) Ltd said: ``We are in need of professionals and the only place we can get them is in universities.``
Ally Abdallah, who is a Marketing Analysts with TIGO, said their company was targeting youth professionals aged between 18 and 28, who are mostly found in universities.
The programme attracted representatives from Vodacom, TIGO, Celtel, NMB, NBC, Reliance Insurance, Standard Chartered Bank, Barclays, KDM and Ernest & Young.
It drew students from University of Dar es Salaam, Mzumbe University, Ardhi University, Institute of Finance Management, FGMS, and Muhimbili Health University.
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