The Nigerian University Engineering Students’ Association (NUESA), University of Nigeria, Nsukka (UNN) chapter, it was a dream fulfilled.
They have been working hard for a while to establish their own website, so it was a day of joy and excitement recently as they gathered at the Faculty of Engineering Lecture Theatre to officially launch their website as well as inaugurate the new executives of the association.
The event, which was organised in collaboration with the Nigerian Society of Engineers (NSE) students’ chapter, was aimed at imparting knowledge as well as bringing out the best in the engineering students.
Delivering his lecture, “Repositioning the Young Graduate Engineer for the New Things and Challenges Ahead,” the Head of Department, Metallurgical and Materials Engineering, UNN, Engr. (Prof) Daniel Obikwelu, urged the NSE and the Council for the Regulation of Engineering in Nigeria (COREN) to embark on an exercise of professionalising Nigerian graduate engineers.
“There is great need to reposition the young graduate engineer for the challenges ahead. COREN is urged to show stronger commitment to all her regulatory functions, especially in the engineering regulation monitoring programme (ERMP), where it concerns the young graduate who are the future of the engineering profession.
“COREN is urged to set up a pragmatically oriented committee to design a curriculum for the possible sixth professionalization year in our universities and polytechnics. They should explore ways and means of supporting the professionalization year, especially the fieldwork or practical segment of the year,” he advised.
Obikwelu noted that the programme by COREN, which brought hope and confidence to many young graduate engineers during the compulsory National Youth Service Corps programme, where engineer corps members were deployed to engineering establishments to acquire enough skills, hit the rocks when such corps members were mandated to teach in secondary schools.
“This requirement derailed the programme and brought unbearable woes to the young graduate engineers during the National Youth Service because all engineers were sent to secondary schools to teach. The question is, how will these young graduate engineers feel about their five years’ professional engineering training, a programme approved by COREN?” he queried.
Earlier, in his opening remarks, the Dean, Faculty of Engineering, UNN, Engr. (Prof.) Ogbonna Okparaku, commended the initiative of the new executives of NUESA.
“It shows that they have vision and mission to accomplish within their tenure of one year. I really commend them for this.
“The launching of the website is very important from the students’ point of view because, through the site, they can link up with the international community and their fellow students in other universities,” he said.
In his acceptance speech, the new president of NUESA, Comrade Godwin Nwangele, promised to take the faculty to greater heights.
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