Technical,vocational education, way out of unemployment – adenuga

Sam awoyinfa takes on the managing director of pefti film institute, biola adenuga and she talks about the importance of technical and vocational education in stemming the rising unemployment in the country the nation‘s unemployment level will be greatly reduced if our leaders place more emphasis on technical and vocational education. This is the view of the managing director, pefti film institute, lagos, biola adenuga.

”our youths are increasingly discovering their natural gifts in creative and artistic endeavors, but there is the need for them to get the necessary training so as to make them blossom,” she says

Adenuga, who explains that youths are currently embracing vocations and professions like acting, costuming, script writing among others, adds that with this type of self-employment drive, the legion of job seekers will be reduced in a short while.

She says, “people are realizing that they need to give expression to other talents that they have. We have doctors, bankers among others who come for one course or the other here. I believe people are coming back to fulfill their dreams and pursue their passion.”

By extension, this current wave of paradigm shift gladdens her heart. She notes that the federal government realized this and has accredited the pefti film institute to award national innovation diploma in film and television production, performing and media arts, and music.

She insists that the accreditation did not come on a platter of gold, as the officials from the national board for technical education who came for the verification exercise, made sure that the facilities found there were up to the required standard.

She reveals that the school runs on 70 per cent practical and 30 per cent theory. She‘s happy too that pefti is now included among polytechnics and it will feature in poly jamb henceforth. ”students can now pick pefti as the school of choice during poly jamb, and they must meet the cut off marks to gain admission into the two year programmed,” she adds

Adenuga stresses that when the school started, the acting class recorded the highest number of students, which was high as 75. The acting class, she notes, had to be split into three classes. Since then, all the courses have been attracting a sizeable number of students, which has kept the institute going.

The school, which currently offers three month certificate courses in acting, presentation, script writing and choreography, equally has six month certificate courses in producing and production management, directing, cinematography, music, costume and make up, set design and editing.

The first challenge the institute faced was how to get lecturers. Again, the issue of the number of courses to be offered, class size, ratio of theory to practical also came up. But we were able to surmount all this. On the whole, i would say god has been the source of our success. It was a risk but a good one,” she says

Though she did not set out to be a resource person in the artistic field but her love for her dad, wale adenuga, who is the producer of papa ajasco and company and other television drama series, began to get her interested in it.

”i studied business management and accounting at the university of lagos, but i love what my dad was doing through his television productions. He creates humour, and put smiles on people‘s faces through papa ajasco and company. Again, his superstory is another thriller. So, i became interested in it too,” she states.

”when my father came up with the idea of establishing pefti, he did not have to look far. I was already a force to reckon with. So i seized the opportunity. I was present at every meeting held with consultants on the project,‘‘ she adds.

Adenuga believes that what is worth doing is worth doing well. Arguing that to be a presenter, you need to decide what nature of programme you want to present. She states, “if it is a tv programme, who are the target audience? What are the colours to use? Which organisations to meet for advertisement or sponsorship?”

”here, we go beyond teaching. We help our students build their character, and we tell them that they must add value wherever they find themselves after graduating,” she explains.

Adenuga says pefti gives 10 scholarships every year, and these are given to those students who pass the aptitude test and other questions that are asked on the relevant courses of study by the candidates.

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