Prof. Idris Bugaje, the Executive Secretary of the National Board for Technical Education (NBTE), Prof.Tunji Olaopa, the Chairman, Federal Civil Service Commission, ASUP President, Shammah Kpanja, Comrade Ridwan Opeyemi Munirudeen, the National President,
National Association of Polytechnic Students (NAPS) and Rectors of Polytechnic Institutions across the country are among stakeholders who resolved that the best way to address the lingering Higher National Diploma (HND) and Bachelor of Science (Bsc) dichotomy is to scrape the HND certification in the Nigeria.
The position was canvassed at a ‘One-day national dialogue on the future of Higher National Diploma (HND) programme in the Nigerian Educational Landscape’ organised by the National Board for Technical Education (NBTE) in Abuja on Tuesday, where stakeholders brainstormed on issues surrounding the continued discrimination of the holders of the HND certificates and fashion out ways of addressing the agelong problem.
Speaking during the event, Prof.Tunji Olaopa, the Chairman, Federal Civil Service Commission, called for the scrapping of HND awarded by polytechnics.
He said that if the lingering professional war between B.Sc./B.Tech. and HND degrees holders must be resolved without totally rendering dysfunctional their originating mandates and purposes, then the recommendation of the Heads of Polytechnics and Colleges of Technology (COHEADS) in their 2007 memorandum to the then Presidential Technical Committee on the Consolidation of Tertiary Institutions must be revisited.
According to him, COHEADS recommended the conversion and upgrading of polytechnics into campuses of their proximate universities while the largest polytechnics in each of the geo-political zones should be converted into full-fledged universities of technology.
“In so doing – and this for me is the game-changer – HND should be scrapped, while the National Diploma (ND) should be retained as a qualifying certificate for entrance into the new and old universities of technology and schools of technology affiliates of existing universities”, Olaopa said.
But he added that “the design should create two streams of B.Sc. (Technology) and B.Tech., with B.Tech. designed to focus on inculcating technical skills and competences across the middle to the very high levels of jobs and careers, a model which the First Technical University, Ibadan (on which Governing Council I was one of the pioneer members) is attempting to pioneer.
“Consequently, the curricula cum pedagogical remodelling of the OND-B.Tech. certification will entail training for demand-driven end users’ skills, while the faculty will draw significantly from scholars-practitioners/professors of practice corps practical oriented lecturers, those with strong strength in theory and research.
“Within this arrangement, the National Diploma (ND) will be expanded to fill in the space for technical and vocational training programmes, which contents should also embed the City and Guild old certification and learning contents in manner that are mutually reinforcing. This would however require aggressive staff development and facilities upgrade and increased funding to make sense.”
According to Olaopa, the new ND-B.Tech. certification stream will benefit greatly from the German dual vocational training model “if benchmarked with action research adaptation to accommodate Nigeria’s peculiarities. The German dual-mode system integrates theory and practice, thinking and doing, systematic and work/factory-based practical classes. Here the costs (when fully institutionalised and functional) of the dual vocational training can be borne proportionately by government and the business community.”
Earlier, Olaopa disclosed that he was ever so glad to contribute to education sector reform conversation as a past Head of Policy Division and Coordinator, Education Sector Strategy Team in the Federal Ministry of Education in 1999-2002.
He disclosed that in 2018, the FGN announced the abolition of the B.Sc./HND dichotomy, while a 2021 bill of the NASS attempted to legislate the policy pronouncement.
But according to him, the policy pronouncement and series of other policy measures taken to concretize the measure are not very helpful for all practical purpose, nor are the assumptions behind them rigorous enough to be in a position to achieve their objective now and in future.
“If they were, significant progress would have been made to resolve the old lingering professional war that seems not to be abating. Whereas I find it easy to champion a two-step NCE-B.Ed. certification model for resolving the same crisis in which colleges of education are enmeshed, pushing for similar remodelling in favour of polytechnics as dual-mode HND-B.Tech. certification, will sure create more problems and complexities than solution”, he said.
According to him, the orientation of the polytechnics and universities are dissimilar, though it could be made to be mutually reinforcing if creatively remodelled.
“While the polytechnics are by design, oriented to train students to acquire job-specific skills, practical knowledge, and industry-relevant competences as hands-on education required to operate in real world-of-work contexts, the universities’ education and learning emphases are to build research-rooted in-depth and cutting-edge knowledge, one that is designed to enable students develop critical thinking and analytical skills.
“University students are therefore trained to acquire expanded intellectual horizons so they can contribute to advancing knowledge in their fields, through the application of scientific theories and principles that enable innovative solutions to complex societal problems.”
But he warned that to attempt a mesh of polytechnic and university education through their convergence for grading, skills pricing and career pathing as is being pushed, at policy levels, will amount to attempting to distort and confuse the quality and purpose of both educational paths.
On his part, the Prof. Bugaje, the NBTE boss, declared that the decision will put an end to the lingering discrimination against HND holders in the country’s public service.
He said: “Well, today we have held this stakeholders engagement. The Minister of State for Education, the Chairman of Civil Service Commission, Unions, Rectors, and other stakeholders, are all here. We have agreed with overall to discontinue with HND. Nigerian polytechnics will continue to offer National Diploma, but after National Diploma, students would be admitted to read Bachelor of Technology (Honours), in their field. It will be a degree that will be different from that surprised by the Nigerian Universities Commission NUC, ours will be a skills-based degree.The regulation will be done by NBTE and the professional bodies, and this will be final answer to the dichotomy, discrimination, and unnecessary, unwarranted discrimination against the HND holders in the Nigerian public service”.
Earlier, Hon. Yusuf Tanko Sununu, the Minister of State for Education, urged stakeholders at the dialogue to critically consider the pros and cons inherent in the scraping of HND, and submit their communique to the ministry, assuring the outcome of the meeting would be pursued vigorously to ensure its actualization.
He said: “Our stand is that they should look at it critically, assessing the pros and cons and then, the guiding principle is that where the benefit outweighs the risk of what they want to do the ministry will support them to do it”
