Dayo Odukoya conducted interviews to understand motivations for pursuing higher education degrees. Many students believed degrees would lead to high-paying jobs, but now there is a surplus of graduates and not enough jobs. The problem is that university curricula focus on the industrial age and train students for paid employment rather than teaching entrepreneurial skills to "create jobs." Graduates lack the skills and experience needed in today's economy. The solution proposed is making entrepreneurship education compulsory in universities to help graduates start their own businesses instead of endlessly searching for few available jobs.
2. Dayo Odukoya - dayoodukoya@gmail.com
Empathy Map
1. Determine who to interview
2. Think of questions or areas of conversation for the interview
3.Select one interview to move forward
4. Go out and talk to people
5. Process the data gathered
6. Craft a problem statement
4. Dayo Odukoya - dayoodukoya@gmail.com
Q1. STRONGEST MOTIVATION FOR
SEEKING SCHOOL DEGREE
• My hypothesis was that – ‘the higher my
degree, the more lucrative job I am likely to
secure’
• Another of my hypothesis was that – ‘Some
professions like banking, oil and
gas, accounting, law, medicine, construction
(etc), tend to earn greater pay more than
professions like teaching; consequently going for
courses leading to these professions will not only
guarantee me a job, but a very lucrative one’.
5. Dayo Odukoya - dayoodukoya@gmail.com
Q2. IN THE 70’s AND 80’s, EMPLOYERS WERE
HUNTING THE FEW GRADUATES OF HIGHER
INSTITUTIONS LIKE ‘BEES’, WITH HIGH
PROMISES. IS THIS PART OF YOUR MOTIVATION
FOR SEEKING TO OBTAIN A DEGREE?
• You are right. Even today, this is still
happening for some professions, hence my
strong hopes of enjoying the same.
6. Dayo Odukoya - dayoodukoya@gmail.com
Q3. TODAY, THE EXPERIENCE/SITUATION TENDS TO BE
REVERSED. IT IS MILLIONS OF GRADUATES NOW DESPERATELY
SEARCHING FOR EMPLOYMENT/EMPLOYERS?
WHAT IS AMISS? WHAT IS THE PROBLEM?
• Most of the tertiary institutions’
curriculum, especially in the public
institutions, tend to be tailored for the
industrial age. Graduates are prepared to seek
for paid employment which is hardly there.
Even then, the requisite skill and professional
competence to effectively handle the jobs are
hardly incorporated into the curricula. The
consequence is that only few of the graduate
end up qualifying for the few available job
spaces.
7. Dayo Odukoya - dayoodukoya@gmail.com
• There is something fundamentally wrong with
institutional curriculum. The problem is not
with seeking academic degrees, rather it is
with the functionality of the acquired degrees.
Students are hardly being trained to “create
jobs” instead of waiting for non-existent jobs.
• The good news is that some private and public
institutions in Nigeria are beginning to wake
up to this call. But the question still is, ‘how
effective are these new entrepreneurial drives
in the tertiary institutions?’.
8. Dayo Odukoya - dayoodukoya@gmail.com
Q4. YOU GRADUATED IN 1994 WITH B.Sc (GEOLOGY) WITH
HOPE OF SECURING GAINFUL EMPLOYMENT (RIGHT?) WHAT
HAS BEEN YOUR EXPERIENCE EVER SINCE?
• You are right. My hopes then were high. Alas, I searched for
job for many years without success. Being a female who
just got married contributed to the difficulty of securing a
job though. Eventually I had to resort to creating jobs for
which I was not trained. I went into starting a nursery and
primary school, and later a secondary school. After many
years of struggling with the business with little or no
investment capital and next to nothing entrepreneurial
skills, I had to begin re-training myself. I went for PGDE and
Masters in Education and recently was opportuned to enjoy
scholarship in the Lagos Business School. After over 12
years of trying to survive, I am just about seeing rays of
light at the end of the tunnel
9. Dayo Odukoya - dayoodukoya@gmail.com
Q5. YOU ARE LOOKING FORWARD TO GRADUATE NEXT
YEAR, WHAT ARE YOUR PLANS AND DREAMS JOB-WISE?
• My university afforded me knowledge on how
to create job via entrepreneurship
development course. After my Masters, which
I hope to undertake abroad (in food
technology or pharmacy), I hope to secure a
job with a related private organization to
further gain practical knowledge/skill while
building capital to launch my own business.
Eventually, I look forward to consolidating in
the real-estate business.
10. Dayo Odukoya - dayoodukoya@gmail.com
Q6. WHAT HAPPENS WITH DOWNSIZING
DUE TO ECONOMIC MELTDOWN?
• For those of us lacking knowledge on
how to create jobs (i.e. entrepreneurial
skills), this would be catastrophic.
• I really think I must begin to build my
entrepreneurial skill and test-run it
against such rainy days.
11. Dayo Odukoya - dayoodukoya@gmail.com
Q7. WAY FORWARD
• From all said, I strongly recommend that
courses in highly practical
entrepreneurship development should be
made compulsory for all students,
especially in tertiary institutions
worldwide.
12. Dayo Odukoya - dayoodukoya@gmail.com
Statement of Problem
• The paid jobs are fast dwindling with each passing day.
It is survival of the fittest. The rate of unemployment is
fast increasing all over the world. The current system
and content of education could hardly meet the
challenge, with few exceptional cases. A significant
number of tertiary institutions hardly have
entrepreneurial skill development injected programs.
Some of those who have such programs hardly have
any empirical proof of the efficacy of such program.
For some graduates equipped with entrepreneurial
skill, the new challenge is raising the necessary
facilities, especially fund, to build a true business that
could stand the test of time.
