By Isaac Kertyo, Makurdi
Benue State Government has been urged to establish technical colleges in each of the twenty three local government areas of the state to boost technical education.
The Acting Executive Secretary, Science and Technical Education Board ( STEB), Pastor Agena Williams who made the call while fielding questions from Day Break, said technical education can take the youths off the streets.
“When you graduate from a technical college as artisans, electricians and all of that even without a job you can take care of yourself. My desire is that government should promote technical education in the state.
We appeal to government to establish at least one technical college in each of the twenty three local government areas. We want to see that each local government has at least one technical college because this will help the youths not to be roaming around the streets, it will give them self reliance.”
The Clergy who has been appointed Acting Executive Secretary of the Board by Governor Hyacinth Alia to run affairs of the board noted that the state is currently having eighteen technical colleges which according to him is grossly inadequate.
The Executive Secretary identified lack of technical teachers as a clog in the wheel of progress of technical education in Benue State, explaining further that without technical Teachers, students can’t receive proper technical education and skills.
“One of the challenges bedeviling technical colleges is lack of teachers, we don’t have enough teaching staff in our colleges. During the recent recruitment of teachers, we were asked to take only one hundred and fifty teachers which is grossly inadequate.”
He appealed to the present administration to come to their plight with the view to sending more teachers to the aforementioned schools to over come the challenges.
