A Consultant for Danank Engineering Company Limited, Dr Daniel Anobaah Ankrah has called on technical universities to collaborate with operators in the industrial sector to find pragmatic solutions to problems facing the nation’s development.
According to him, such partnership should involve the training of students to acquire technical skills and be translated into realistic and achievable national objectives.
“With the rapid changes in technology and it potential applications, it has become imperative that active partnership should be made with industry and organisations,” Dr Anobaah said.
Dr Ankrah who made the call at the second session of the 18th Congregation of the Koforidua Technical University (KTU), in Koforidua, on Saturday, said that the training of students to become skilled human resources would help accelerate national development and create jobs.
A total of 1,692 graduands graduated with Higher National Diploma in various disciplines at the congregation on the theme: “Effective Technical University-Industry Collaboration: Key to Manpower Development and Possible Job Creation in Ghana.”
Dr Ankrah noted that the country was searching for appropriate strategies to harness its natural human resources to promote economic growth to improve the living conditions of the people.
“Our society, as a member of the global village is also going through the effects of rapid economic and political changes that are taking place all over the world,” he said.
Dr Ankrah said there was the need to improve the country’s scientific and technological base to be able to cope with the effects of challenges.
He called for the provision of quality education to many Ghanaians towards socio-economic and political development.
Dr Ankrah said “the nation would continue to look up to technical universities as main producers of human resource, who were critical thinking graduates with the requisite expertise to power industry for accelerated development of the nation.”
He called on technical universities to fulfil their mandate as clearly spelt out in the Technical Universities Act 2016 (Act 922) and through ICT train higher level technical personnel needed for national development.
The Vice Chancellor of KTU, Professor David Kofi Essumang, stated that although KTU has chalked a lot of successes, the university faced challenges, mentioning insufficient fund, lack of staff office space and residential, hostel facilities, inadequate library and ICT facilities.
He said more than two-thirds of students lived in private-rented buildings in immediate communities and appealed to the government, to allocated Ghana Education Trust Fund (GETFund) money to improve infrastructural development.
Professor Samuel Apori, Council Chairman for KTU, advised the graduands not to look up to government alone for employment, but to use the knowledge and skills acquired to create jobs for themselves and for others.
FROM AMA TEKYIWAA AMPADU AGYEMAN, KOFORIDUA