An internship programme is one bridge urgently needed to bring down the walls between the public and private sectors in addressing the menace of unemployment and closing the gap between the ‘haves’ and ‘have-nots’. A nation is not built on the back of walls of divide, but on consistently finding ways to bring them down.
How do we get our youths better engaged, away from the frivolities that seem to dominate their thought and engagements? How can those who are able to get by in the service sector of the economy contribute to taking the youths off idle pursuits and re-direct them into channeling their energy into more meaningful endeavour?
One way that readily comes to mind is the institution of a more encompassing system and culture of internship. The government, at all levels, ought to take the lead in fashioning a framework for this. A policy built around a reward system for employers who take unemployed youths on internships, vacation jobs, and open them up to other forms of hands-on training – anything that brings the youth under professional/technical wings for some form of tutelage needs to be speedily crafted.
The internship system is so well-entrenched in Germany, for instance. The way it is made to work is such that both employers and interns find it compelling to key into. There are also a number of things I find instructive in the local apprenticeship scheme in our informal sector (practised in different forms by artisans and traders) – things we can borrow, adopt and adapt to suit the formal sector, especially tinkering with the tax policy, and rebate system to engineer increased absorption from the streets, and to impart skills and tackle unemployment
Every secondary school student willing to work or learn new skills in his/her spare time should be able to secure a place, not to talk of vacation jobs, which, I think, should be compulsory. I believe we are faced with an emergency and that there is an urgent need for a re-armament that impacts the values of integrity and respect for others in the younger ones. I believe that we are faced with an urgent need for a rewiring of many younger minds to see the sense in a healthy work ethic, civility, service and good knowledge of civics, for the sake of the nation.
Internship, I see, as a tool for proper acculturation. Every secondary school leaver should be able to have post-school internship opportunities (with token allowance paid, where possible). Yet, it must be understood that the emphasis is not on the monetary reward, but the invaluable opportunities it will open up for interns in terms of personal and life skills development, apart from the head-start they have on life with the benefit of hands-on experience on the job. Also, this also helps to pass on to the generations behind the necessity and spirit of volunteering.
…instituting a culture of internship is one way of bridging the gap. It offers to the over-pampered the opportunity to see life as it is, outside the tinted glass. It offers to those condemned to the bottom a ladder to see what they can aspire to and opportunity to express talents and gifts that might otherwise have been buried and lost to the nation.
Interestingly, the culture of sending secondary school students on internship is already being practised by some of the high-brow schools in town. Again, this reinforces the yawning gulf between the children of the ‘haves’ and the ‘have-nots’. Those who go to these top schools have the benefit of a more-rounded education as they are exposed to all the swimming and music lessons, leadership classes and the life skills training that equip them with the right skills to navigate the world with its ever-changing needs. Those not privileged to go to these schools miss out on the right opportunities, further pushing them down the ladder, almost cementing their place as hewers of wood and drawers of water for the children of the privileged class who move on from these schools to tertiary education abroad, in the exceptional cases where secondary education was here in Nigeria in some fancy foreign-oriented school transplanted from US or UK.
So, we keep putting up walls even as we prepare for tomorrow. Children of the pampered elite, catered to, on one side. Those of the poor, shackled to the bottom, deprived of all opportunities, on the other side. They go to different schools. They worship in different religious centres. Their playgrounds differ. They work with different toys. Their dreams are different in texture, situated in different contexts. Yet, these children will grow up to live together in the same country and interact at some point. The demarcations are all over – the Islands and mainland in Lagos State. Maitama and Kubwa in Abuja.
Of course, demarcations exist worldwide, but where policies and constructs lend themselves into reinforcing the development of one part and the neglect of the other, then questions have to be asked. It is because public institutions of education, health, housing, and infrastructure have been neglected, where not destroyed, that regular folks have gotten sunk in the rat-race to be able to afford the basics that have become luxuries cornered by those at the top for their exclusive use.
Perhaps, instituting a culture of internship is one way of bridging the gap. It offers to the over-pampered the opportunity to see life as it is, outside the tinted glass. It offers to those condemned to the bottom a ladder to see what they can aspire to and opportunity to express talents and gifts that might otherwise have been buried and lost to the nation. While the government works on the nuts and bolts of a policy, the private sector (organised and disorganised) can, on its own, begin to make more meaningful moves in that direction, if only it is able to see the big picture.
There are too many walls in place already. Misunderstanding on account of religious persuasion and ethnic divide keep putting up walls. The broken educational system and healthcare sector have erected walls barring many from the other side a chance to climb the ladder. Every nation of note deliberately institutes policies to enable social mobility, for they recognise that without such opportunities deliberately created, the nation decays from within. An internship programme is one bridge urgently needed to bring down the walls between the public and private sectors in addressing the menace of unemployment and closing the gap between the ‘haves’ and ‘have-nots’. A nation is not built on the back of walls of divide, but on consistently finding ways to bring them down.
Simbo Olorunfemi works for Hoofbeatdotcom, a Nigerian Communications Consultancy. Twitter: @simboolorunfemi
