Why youths should put skills over jobs

The World Youth Skills Day is another opportunity for youths to examine the efforts they have made towards personal capacity development. As it’s seen in the world today, youths are one of the most under-represented subsets of the global population when it comes to decision making. This is not due to under-population of youths, but […]

The World Youth Skills Day is another opportunity for youths to examine the efforts they have made towards personal capacity development. As it’s seen in the world today, youths are one of the most under-represented subsets of the global population when it comes to decision making. This is not due to under-population of youths, but a jaundiced, stigmatized perception of youths by the ruling class all around the world.

 Although the terms “youth” and “young people” are conceived differently by people in different parts of the world, they most commonly refer to adolescents and young adults between the ages of 10 and 24. Other sources extend this age bracket to include people of ages 29 or 35 but one factor is common to all; youth is the period (transition stage) between childhood and adulthood. Demographically, youths have a global population of 1.1 billion, which is 18 per  cent of the entire world’s population. Sixty per cent  live in Asia; 15 per cent, in Africa; 10 per cent, in Latin America and the Caribbean; and the remaining 15 per cent, in developed countries.

These facts echo the unparalleled significance of youths in our world today and reiterate their importance in planning for future generation.

 Unfortunately, rather than being major stakeholders in devising global developmental programs, youths themselves are the subject of global challenges with many facing possibilities of early marriage, early childbearing, incomplete education and the threat of HIV and AIDS.

 Poverty is a state of penury and lack. The only antidote to it is earning through just means. The perception of “go-to-school, get-a-job-after” has led many youths to believe skill acquisition is not for them and that leaves the world with a teeming population of “clueless youths”. It is time for youths to acquire skills and take up vocations they are passionate about. That will lift them well beyond the poverty and marginalization indices.

Many are also of the opinion that formal education is only what makes someone literate. I urge the youths not to be afraid of failing but should take bold steps to change the current situation.

 Ogunjobi Muyiwa Felix wrote from Port Harcourt