Of note is the arrangement in Strathmore University in Kenya, where they have an Innovation/Incubation Hub called
iLabAfrica where they seek to attract the best brains on their campus with a view of training them in the art of software engineering and all sorts and ideas that the students produced if commercially viable are funded and start-ups emerge from there.
So the poser for us all in our society is this, while it is gladdening to note that we are becoming more aware of the need to encourage, train and develop the crop of our local software engineers and encourage more people to become developers and take the gauntlet, it is saddening to note that the real battle to develop the next wave of software engineers is supposed to be taking place our higher institutions of learning at various levels, where we should be investing a great deal of our resources, time and energy in creating a conducive environment that would simulate, encourage and help the younger ones back in our various institutions of learning to take up a career in the nascent software industry in Nigeria.
Why is this important?
It is very important to equip the younger ones back in the various higher institutions of learning because it has been proven that a large chunk of the crop of graduates produced by the higher institutions of learning are not employable. However, if while they in school they were under some kind of tutorship in the art of software engineering or maybe acquire a skill set of Graphics Designer, they would not only be confident of securing a good job offer, they might go the extra mile of setting up a startup company, thereby marginally reducing the number of people looking for employment after school.
While growing up we were brought up with the phrase that we are the giants of Africa, if indeed we want to remain competitive in the comity of nations, especially on the African sphere, we need to set up Innovation/Incubation Hubs in our various Higher Institutions of Learning to truly become Centres of Excellence and make a deliberate attempt to review our curricula to produce the next Linus Torvalds.
Conclusion
Only when we can create the enabling environment and provide the necessary mentorship and guidance are we sure that we have secured the future of our great country and also guarantee that the dream of becoming one of the most industrialized economies by year 2020 is not just another policy of inconsistencies from the government but a well thought plan aimed at developing capacity for the ICT industry.
