Engineers seek paradigm shift in engineering education

The General Manager, Renewable Energy, Niger Delta Power Holding Company (NDPHC), Mrs. Valerie Agberagba, has reiterated the urgency for a paradigm shift in engineering education to reposition graduates towards developing industry-relevant skills.

She noted that the traditional technical skills and old ways of doing things have become ineffective, hence, the need to embrace new norms to meet societal and environmental challenges of the increasingly complex connected world.

Agberagba made the call at the yearly Nigerian Institution of Mechanical Engineering (NIMECHE) symposium/lecture series entitled: ‘Managing Engineering Profession in Digital World: Developing and Exploring Value Chain’.

She lamented that engineering education is one area that is least invested in, and is inadequate for the digital world and suggested a decisive and more agile approach towards regulation with stakeholders’ collaboration.

Agberagba said the engineering profession is rapidly evolving, saying, to effectively survive, manage and succeed in this fourth industrial revolution era, engineers must clearly define a strategy for integrating digital technologies into all engineering processes.

For her, there was a need to review and realign engineering education and adopt new approaches to producing the future engineers, who will be relevant to the industries.

She suggested that barriers and policies that will hinder this, should be eliminated, adding that government policies should be aligned to engineering and technological advancement.