By Joseph Lamin Kamara
Crown Technical University College is encouraging Sierra Leoneans to go in for technical training at tertiary institutes where formal education at universities such as Fourah Bay College appears impossible to acquire.
Dr Andrew Curtis, the proprietor of Crown, as the institute is also known, even thinks the job market needs more technically trained employees than people with formal qualifications in disciplines such as Law and Political Science.
There are 60% of jobs in the middle manpower sector and they require technical expertise, he said at a news conference on Wednesday.
Dr Curtis explained that there are emerging areas such as electrical installations, computer engineering, marketing, customer service, and petroleum which now have quicker lucrative job offers.
“We don’t have the right people to take these jobs,” he added.
He revealed that his institute, which was established in 2012, had come to provide skilled trainings in those areas.
Crown has accreditation from Sierra Leone’s Tertiary Education Commission (TEC) to function as an institute offering certificates and diplomas. The institute offers certificates, diplomas and higher national diplomas (HNDs) in Business Management, Human Resource Management, Computing and Telecommunications Engineering, Oil and Petroleum Engineering, among others.
Acquiring the qualifications can lead to acquisition of university degrees “awarded by internationally recognized British awarding bodies and universities,” he said.
And according to Dr Curtis, the institute offers opportunity to progress for studies to the UK for final year training.
On Wednesday Crown was formerly welcoming its newly appointed-fulltime principal Engineer Samuel Theophilus Powers, who has been working at the National Power Authority (now EDSA) for 21 years.
Engineer Powers who has taken the post of principal after Mr Abdul Sankoh, who served as a caretaker principal, also lectured for five years at Njala University College.
“I decided to come to Crown because I believe I can contribute to the middle manpower of Sierra Leone,” said the new principal.
But Engineer Powers confessed he would be challenged with the imperative formal educational style in the country, in which everyone seems to regard qualifications from University of Sierra Leone and Njala University College as the only requirements for jobs.
He however encouraged young people to pursue technical trainings at institutes like Crown.
The institute presently has over 300 students and is set to graduate its first set of students in December.
(C) Politico 26/08/15
