The Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFund) has explained why it is considering suspending foreign scholarships.
TETFund executive secretary, Arch. Sonny Echono, stated this at a One-Day Stakeholders’ Engagement on Emerging Issues with the TETFund Intervention in Abuja yesterday.
The workshop was organised by the Fund to foster open dialogue and collaboration among its key stakeholders and drive positive changes while accelerating the development of Nigeria’s education sector.
According to Echono, the recent Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) policy had created difficulties in the payment of foreign scholarship tuition fees and stipends.
The TETfund boss said since the funds allocation was barely enough to service programmes under its Tertiary Scholarship for Academic Staff (TSAS), the fund was considering suspending foreign scholarships while also considering an upward review of local scholarships.
”The fund at this material time is also discouraging beneficiary institutions from initiating new Benchwork programmes.
”Additionally, there are issues related to scholars not returning to serve their bonds at their home institutions upon completion of their programmes.
”Infact the challenge of scholars absconding has undermined and complicated the TSAS programme and brought it under intense scrutiny.
”It is for these and other reasons that this engagement was organised. We need to address these challenges and find solutions to ensure the effective and smooth implementation of our scholarship programmes,” he said.
Meanwhile, as part of efforts to deliver professionalism and efficient services, Echono said the submission of proposals for the physical infrastructure projects by institutions will, henceforth be carried out online.
According to him, in an effort to leverage on communication and information technology to expand access, improve quality and promote inclusiveness in the delivery of tertiary education, the Fund has intensified the implementation of its digital literacy road map, with the full implementation of the LDI online submissions platform.
He said; “Henceforth the submission of proposals for the physical infrastructure projects by institutions will be carried out online.
“The provision of fixed mobile internet services to staff and students of various institutions programmes will also be fully implemented.
“The Fund is also implementing the converged services programme which includes capacity development and train the trainer on communication skills and online certification courses for students across institutions.
“The capacity-building programme and training-the-trainer and technical works for blackboard enhanced e-learning platform is currently being implemented, while the phase two of the thesis digitisation project will proceed as planned.”
Echono, who further noted that the Fund has taken steps aimed at repositioning and advancing its objectives since he assumed office, said the one-day interactive engagement with heads of beneficiary institutions was initiated last year to gather valuable feedback on TETFund intervention projects.
He said the invaluable inputs received have been instrumental in refining its strategies and ensuring that their projects are tailored to meet the specific needs of beneficiary institutions.
The TETfund boss mentioned some of the reforms implemented to include a review of the Audit Process to curb attendant delays.
According to him, the Fund took proactive steps to address issues related to distressed and abandoned projects across institutions by strengthening and streamlining its proposals review process and implementing a robust Monitoring and Evaluation policy, which helped it to achieve smoother and faster execution of physical infrastructure interventions.
Speaking further, he said the rate of inflation in the country has made it necessary that the Fund reconsider the fixed cost regime for physical infrastructure intervention depending on the project lifecycle, saying that projects with more than one year lifecycle were likely to be affected by inflation and rise in cost of materials, as such variation in such cases may be justifiable.
“The Fund is further considering either converting the Fabrication interventions line to Skills acquisition or introducing Skill Acquisition as an Annual Direct Disbursement Intervention line.
“There is also the need to undertake a comprehensive audit of all equipment, particularly the skill G equipment, procured and delivered to institutions to establish their status and identify those that require upgrade.
“It will also enable the Fund to avoid their duplication in subsequent interventions.”
Highlighting some of the successes recorded, the executive secretary said the Fund has successfully sponsored over 37,000 scholars for both foreign and local PhDs, Masters, Bench Work, and Postdoc programs in various institutions.
Sharing the outcomes of the National Employability Benchmarking Assessment Programme conducted for selected universities across the country, which he said was made possible with the invaluable support of the International Finance Corporation (IFC), Echono noted that the primary objective of the exercise was to identify sector trends and provide comparative institutional findings on the employability situation at a systemic level.
“We held a stakeholder’s debriefing session on 6th February 2023, during which the IFC presented the early findings from the exercise. Subsequently, after successfully completing the programme the IFC submitted the final report in May 2023, which has been shared with the Federal Ministry of Education (FME), the National Universities Commission (NUC), and all the beneficiary universities.
“As we move forward, we are committed to implementing the recommendations outlined in the IFC report and findings from the exercise. To this end, we propose organizing an Implementation Support Workshop on Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) in employability.
“The workshop aims to lay a strong foundation and chart a clear direction for practical solutions to the challenges identified in the IFC report that hinder the employability of Nigerian graduates.
“The Implementation Support Workshop on KPIs in employability will be facilitated by employability experts from the IFC, alongside local experts in Nigeria. We aim to gather representatives from the beneficiary universities, NUC, FME, and the Fund for this interactive session.
“During the workshop, we will address the challenges and recommendations pertaining to poor career services, tracking, and documenting employability KPIs, and the lack of robust academia-industry linkages. Additionally, we recognize the importance of empowering the staff of Career Units in Nigerian Universities,” he added.
Also speaking, the Acting Executive Secretary, National Universities Commission (NUC), Chris Maiyaki called on the need to develop new strategies for funding while ensuring sensitivity of the evolving challenging dynamics through qualitative funding.
Maiyaki advised the fund to revamp its monitoring mechanism for quality assurance so as to have a better return on investment on its projects.
Meanwhile, the Chairman of the House Committee on TETFund, Mrs Miriam Onuoha said in making essential infrastructure available in tertiary institutions, there was need to ensure inclusivity especially with Persons Living With Disabilities (PLWD).
“In our physical planning, we must make the building accessible to be accommodating to the needs of PLWD,” she said.
For his part, the former Executive Secretary of NUC, Prof. Peter Okebukola, called for a monitoring and implementation system to ensure that academic calendars of universities were adhered to.
Okebukola who spoke on TSAS, emerging issues and possible solutions, clamoured for reduced TETFund overseas scholarships while encouraging in-country training in TETFund strengthened PG programmes.
He said that rather than continuously spending a lot of funds on foreign training, local universities should be provided with state-of-the-art facilities while carrying out accreditation of postgraduate programmes.
”In offering solutions to these challenges, there is need to offer TETFund support to top-rate lecturers from overseas universities to come to Nigeria to join local PG training by Nigerian professors.”
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