Varsities must produce graduates that are globally competitive – TETFund Boss

THE Executive Secretary of Tertiary Education Trust Fund, Dr Abdullahi Bichi Baffa has challenged the Nigerian universities on the need to ensure that graduates churned out from the institutions are globally competitive.

He said the intervention by the agency to public tertiary institutions in the country was targeted at improving the teaching and learning environment, both in content and physical infrastructure.

Baffa, spoke while commissioning the new Academic Complex of Tai Solarin University of Education sponsored by TETFund, where he also enjoined all academic staff in the various tertiary institutions in the country to embrace the qualities of a good teacher.

He commended the management of Tai Solarin University for dreaming big and ahead through the mission statement, pledging that TETFund would give the university maximum support to achieve its dream of producing quality graduates that would contribute to the development of the nation.

Dr Baffa noted that the current administration of President Muhammadu Buhari was committed to the realisation of the dream of making Nigeria become one of the key players in global competitiveness.

He insisted that education sector remains key since it produces the human capital needed to drive the nation’s development process.

He drew the attention of the audience and the management of Tai Solarin University to the institution’s mission statement, pointing out that his worries was in the area of training persons that would have the capacity to compete globally.

According to him, while Nigerian universities were still thinking of what to do for the future, universities in most of the developed countries have moved away “from where we are aspiring to be, and there is need for efforts and strategies to doubles up.”