News – Page 41 – UoN Office of Career Services (OCS)

ENABLING YOUTH EMPLOYMENT (EYE) DASHBOARD FOR AFRICA

The African Development Bank (AfDB) places the plight of the youth at the center of its approach to promoting Economic Development in Africa. The AfDB believes that investing in youth is an important aspect of the promotion of inclusive and sustainable economic growth in Africa.

AfDB held an expert consultation meeting on developing of the Enabling Youth Employment (EYE) Dashboard for Africa on Tuesday, July 2, 2019, at their offices. The University of Nairobi was represented by Johnson Kinyua, Director, Career Services and Naomi Nyaboga, Chief Information Officer.

The EYE dashboard provides a comprehensive view of the state of youth employment in African Countries and highlights the gaps, barriers, and enablers of youth participation in economic activities. The tool also encourages countries to step up efforts on labor market data and provides policymakers and researchers with a rich source of information to appreciate the nexus between youth empowerment and economic development.

It is estimated that more than half of African Youth are unemployed or underemployed and this brings about high rates of poverty. There is also an increase in university graduates becoming unemployed due to a lack of relevant skills for the ever-evolving job market. There is, therefore, need to match skills relevant to the job market. The AfDB ‘Enable Youth Project’ is helping to address job creation and employable skills.

The Office of Career Services is at the forefront of partnering with AfDB to develop Africa’s next generation of a digitally-enabled workforce. This is a dream that the OCS Office shares with the African Development Bank, Microsoft, Rockefeller Foundation and Google. This is being achieved through “The Jobs for Youth Africa (JfYA) Coding for Employment flagship program” aimed at developing and launching Africa’s next generation of digitally enabled youthful workforce that has been rolled out at UoN. AfDB will also support the creation of a Centre of Excellence at UoN to create a digitally-enabled workforce.

Career Path Testimony

When I was 9 my father would say “Go to school finish, go to the University and get employed” to him then, getting to the university was the ultimate requirement for getting employed. 11 years down the line, I do my research and find out from a local newspaper that it takes more than just a degree to beat unemployment since thousands of graduates are out and busy “tarmacking”.

I feel betrayed realizing that my choice of a degree course has a rare chance of employment and that it probably adds no value to the job market. I find myself considering dropping out and just settling for whatever the harsh job market has to offer. However, this consideration is way too costly to bear because of the tens of thousands of hard-earned money my family and village had to raise through “Harambee” in order to bake me for a successful future.

The only thing I have do is to sit down and see if my already acquired knowledge can offer a solution.
I turn on my laptop and browse through a few articles on unemployment. All I see is numbers, statistics of unemployed fellow victims of the system and huge blame on the 8-4-4 system.

The 8-4-4 system of education is portrayed to be the unfavorable chief contributor to this situation of having graduates who are unable to secure jobs because it focuses on academic grades at the expense of molding an all rounded individual being a major pointer. I clearly understand that we recently abandoned it to a new one, 2-6-3-3-3, but that’s going to save the coming generation but what happens to the thousands who are still out and those are finalizing the system.

In August 2018, the Government launched the Office of Career Services (OCS) in all Universities and Tertiary Institutions for developing essential competencies among graduates that will produce the appropriate human capital for industrialization of the region-the skills that will enable society to innovate and foster the type of rapid technological progress that characterizes industrial revolution.

Partnering with this office will for sure give an upward push towards earning as an individual who has been learning
for the better part of their life.

Baraka Isaac

Intern

Office of Career Services

Coding for Employment Program launched at UoN by the Office of Career Services

Developing Africa’s next generation of a digitally-enabled workforce is the dream that the Office of Career Services shares with the African Development Bank, Microsoft, Rockerfeller Foundation and Google. This is being achieved through “The Jobs for Youth Africa (JfYA) Coding for Employment flagship program” aimed at developing and launching Africa’s next generation of digitally enabled youthful workforce.

The Office of Career Services launched the Training of Trainers for the Coding for Employment program on Monday, July 1 and the training runs till Friday, July 5, 2019. The program will: 1) equip 130 centers of excellence with ICT infrastructure, 2) train young people in demand driven ICT skills and entrepreneurship and 3) provide graduates with linkages to the ICT ecosystem for internships and job opportunities. Specifically, each center of excellence is expected to train at least 1,800 young people which will contribute to the wider program objective of training 234,000 youth and creating 9 million jobs over the next decade. Five (5) countries have been identified to pilot the program namely Kenya, Rwanda, Nigeria, Senegal, and Cote d’Ivoire. In each country, a maximum of five innovation centers of excellence will be hosted in partner institutions.

Through demand-driven training, the program will equip youth across the continent with the skills needed to secure ICT, ICT-enabled and ICT services employment. The program will provide both technical, and entrepreneurship skills that are transferable across sectors. The beneficiaries of this program will be youth aged between 15 and 35 years who are currently unemployed or underemployed with particular consideration given to vulnerable and disadvantaged youth. The program will strategically position them to compete for the jobs of the “present” and the “future”. Beyond skills development, the program seeks to drive the creation of an “innovation ecosystem” where key stakeholders (private sectors, youth, and government) in the sector can adopt a sustainable, integrated and holistic approach focused on promoting the innovative use of digital tools to solve social problems in Africa. As such the program will support the development of 130 innovation centers of excellence which will provide a platform to host best practices, private sector linkages and support training programs.

The Office of Career Services is focusing on developing the digital skills of its students to enable them competitively secure an employment opportunity or become their own bosses.

Winding up of Student Life And Finding a Job

Most university students have a special place that they enjoy being at when they are within the campus or during their stay in school. A place that makes them comfortable and for a minute helps them forget about the world and the amount of work they have and even deadlines that have to be met.

Now just try and picture the absolute horror when students come to the realization that their safe havens are crushing in on them. A life that they have loved, cherished and gotten good chunks of is being flattened. They now have to transition to employment or entrepreneurship and they are terrified not knowing where to start.

I know what you are probably thinking now, “but I don’t want to leave campus!” or “no one will hire me!” Try as you might however, there is no escaping this one. It’s time to accept that you are done with your Diploma, Masters or Undergraduate degree and you must transition from learning to earning to practice what you have learned in university.

Some students have it clear in their minds what career path they would like to follow but a good number of students come to the end of their university lives without even the slightest idea of what career path to follow.

At the University of Nairobi Office of Career Services, we offer advice on all the possible career paths that a student could undertake, students are also mentored by alumni and career partners in the various fields that they might want to pursue after they are done with their courses. The Office of Career Services also helps to link students to the job market on completion of their courses and also to obtain internships and attachments.

International Yoga Day at UoN

The International Federation of Yoga Professionals, Kenya and the Kenya India Friendship Association in collaboration with the University of Nairobi Career Services celebrated the International Yoga Day on Friday, 21st June 2019 at the University of Nairobi, Main Campus. Students and Staff participated in this unwinding event.

UoN students get an opportunity to make Money as a Content Creators with Scooper

On Thursday 20th of June 2019, the Office of Career Services Hosted a team from Scooper at UoN Main Campus for a briefing session with students on opportunities they have to make money as content creators.

Scooper is a news application Company and part of Transsion Holdings, the makers of Tecno, Infinix and Itel smartphones, that delivers trending and breaking news across Africa. The Scooper App has a 4.6 rating and over 10 million downloads on Playstore. Scooper would like to give UoN students an opportunity to showcase their talent in generating content and writing articles in various disciplines such as sports, health, entertainment, technology, business, politics, etc. and generate revenue.

Students who will enroll for the Scooper Professional Generated Content (PGC) program will get a chance to earn revenue and train for quality content creating as they continue with their studies. Students were given a link (http://cp.scoopernews.com/) through which they would access the backend for the scooper website and sign up for a blog on which they will post their content. Scooper also offered 50 opportunities for the students who have graduated for a full-time paid internship.

Scooper invited students interested in the PGC and internship opportunities to register with them and over 60 students signed up for these opportunities. Selected students will go through a training session on content development to sharpen their writing skills at the scooper offices.

The Office of Career Services appreciates Scooper for taking time to talk to UoN students about “Making Money as Content Creators”. It is hoped that students will take up availed opportunities and make money as content creators.

UoN Students paying attention to Scooper News App briefing

Unilever Kenya Mentors UoN Engineering Students On Career Paths

The Office of Career Services in collaboration with the Engineering Students Association hosted Unilever Kenya on Wednesday 19^th June. 2019 at UoN, Main Campus for an Industrial Talk on ‘Choosing a Career Path’. The Team from Unilever consisted of the Vice President, a team from the Human Resource Department, Project Managers, Supply Chain Engineers as well as interns attached to the company.

Unilever is one of the world’s leading consumer goods companies, producing and selling around 400 nutrition, hygiene and personal care range of brands in more than 190 countries.

Delene Fisher, the Vice President Supply Chain EA, and Unilever Tea Plantations at Unilever Kenya Limited gave a presentation to the UoN Engineering students on choosing a career path. The key points that she highlighted that students should consider when choosing a career path include; ensuring you understand what matters to you, looking at the practicalities of your passions and being committed enough to take the next step of making sense of the options available to you.

A short question and answer session followed after the presentation, forming a basis for feedback and interaction with the students on choosing a career path. The students thereafter had a breakout session in which they had one-on-one interactions with the team from Unilever. The discussions centered on matters career options for the engineering students.

The Office of Career Services appreciates Unilever for taking time to talk to UoN Engineering students about ‘Choosing a Career Path’. The UoN Career Office looks forward to a continued partnership with Unilever in offering job and internship opportunities for students.

Huawei Certified Internet Associate Training for UoN Students

Through the partnership between Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd and the UoN Office of Career Services, 40 Students have been trained for the HCIA Routing and Switching Course and are yet to sit for their final certification examinations.

The training commenced on 20th of May, 2019 and ended on 14 of June 2019 after which the students sat for a mock examination on 17th of June 2019.

HCIA-Routing & Switching certification validates the knowledge and skills required for basic configuration and maintenance of small to medium-sized networks.

HCIA-Routing & Switching curriculum includes, but is not limited to the following:
Network fundamentals;
Basic connection methods of popular networks;
Basic network construction;
Troubleshooting of common network faults;
Installation and commissioning of Huawei routing and switching devices.

The students await the final exam which will be done on the 24th of June 2019.

RADA App Officially Launched During Nairobi Innovation week 2019

The Mobile health application developed by students and praised by Deputy Vice Chancellor, Academic Affairs, Prof. Julius Ogeng’o as “an application that addresses reality among the youth”, was officially launched during the Nairobi Innovation Week 2019 on Thursday, June 13, 2019, in Taifa Hall.

According to research undertaken by UNESCO and the university through the Centre for HIV Prevention and Research (CHIVPR) on issues affecting the youth and how the issues could be tackled, students spend more time on Smartphones more than any other thing, reaching them through a Mobile application would be the best way to capture their attention so as to tackle the issues of mental health, alcohol and drug abuse, sexual and reproductive health.

UNESCO Regional Director, Ms. Anne Theresa hailed the University of Nairobi and the students that took part in this initiative. She also charged the University with a mandate to bring change through this innovation not only at the UoN but to all the other institutions of higher learning in Africa.

UoN Vice Chancellor, Prof. Peter Mbithi appreciated the support that all partners offered (UNESCO, Ministry of health, NASCOP, NACADA, Sexual and Reproductive Health, I choose Life ) in seeing the success of this innovation.

Silmak Agencies scoops an award of Kshs. 700,000 at NIW 2019

Taking up position one in the Growth stage startups, Silmak Agencies won a Cash Prize of KSh 700,000 from the Kenya National Innovation Agency (KENIA), Mentorship by Chandaria Capital, 100% Scholarship to the Sinapis’ Entrepreneur Academy’s 4 month programme, Purchase and hosting of domain name (.co.ke) for a period of one year from the Kenya Network Innovation Centre (KeNIC).

Kencoco and Bentos Energy came in second and third respectively.

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