₦airaland Forum

semid4lyfe:
As long as Samson Siasia, Sunday Oliseh, Khadiri Ikhana, Okey Emordi and Maurice Cooreman (an "oyinbo" Nigerian) haven't been given the chance to tinker the Super Eagles, I will NEVER subscribe to the idea of a foreign coach.

WELL THEN YOU WOULD CONTINUE TO DWELL IN MEDIOCRITY SON. HOPE YOUR EAGLES GET USED TO DWELLING ON MEDIOCRE ISLAND.

check out Enyeama's performances here at 3:05 http://www.footytube.com/video/olympique-lyon-schalke-04-sep14-56197

In this century, the areas of science that are going to experience breakthroughs are in the area of MATERIALS, NANOTECHNOLOGY AND GREEN TECH. Most countries are investing heavily in this areas because the potential here is enormous. Investing in this fields leads to job creation, just check out this triumph in nanotechnology.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=36yNz6Zde5M

ILEKE IDI,
YOU TOO MUCH JARE. THIS IS AN AWESOME POST. WISH YOUR GATORS THE BEST THIS SEASON.

Kobojunkie:
But many of us already work with our hands and have long given up on waiting for MR Government to show up and do everything even in Nigeria. Matter of fact, many of us CONTRIBUTE thousands of our time and money to development that MR Government in most of Africa and Nigeria continues to ignore! 

kobojunkie,
Great point. No country develops without good governance (government). There is no developed country in the world that has a government as pathetic as Nigeria's. Its government policy to make sure that its educational system is very functional and that it is producing people that are productive to society. If we could all do without the govt. then why are we even a country in the first place? we might as well go back to living in hamlets and huts afterall no country can live without a leader (just go to Somalia and see). 
Take a look at country's like Israel, Japan, Korea, Singapore and China, this countries developed by heavy government planning and intervention. The governments decided to industrialize there countries and in order to do this they were going to heavily fund education especially through scientic and technological research (especially Israel). Look at California that was primarily an agrarian society but through HEAVY, HEAVY INVOLVEMENT by the state govt. it decided to create an atmosphere that would make Cali the centre of the hi-tech world. Now Cali has the 6th largest economy in the world (a state for that matter, not even a country). If the govt. had done nothing, maybe Cali would be like Mississippi now (lol  ). I am saying this to highlight the importance of the govt in scientific innovation and basically bringing out the best in its people. If Einstein, Steve jobs or Bill Gates had gone to some of the primary and secondary schools that we went to, its arguable that we would have ever had about them. Maybe they would have been "local champions" (JET scholars) rather than world beaters.
As a finance man, it would be awesome to see VC firm's flooding naija to fund sart ups but as of right now, there is no innovation or technology coming from the academic and scientific community and its the job of the govt. to address that by stepping in abi what are we paying them for? Its amazing how much people expect from there govts here in the developed world. My oh my, is the pressure unbelievable at times, but unfortunately our people in naija don't understand how govt works so they really underestimate how leadership can radically transform every aspect of society (go check out Singapore, Deng Xiaoping's influence in China or Ben Gurion's exploits in Israel) and bring the best out of its people.

doyin13:
. . .just saw LA Confidential like for the twentieth time. That film just gets better and better.

Right up there amongst the best I ever seen.

Yep! awesome movie. I wish hollywood still made film noir's though

SEEEE NYANSSSSSH!!! , ((am in love)). BUT WHY ISNT SHE LIGHT SKIN?

CANT SHE BLEACH?

ARE YOU SERIOUS?!? BLEACHING IS UGLY, IT MAKES YOU LOOK LIKE MICHAEL JACKSON. I HAVE A FRIEND WHO IS SOOOOOO BEAUTIFUL BUT SHE BLEACHES A LOT AND WHEN YOU SEE HER NOW, SHE LOOKS EXTREMELY UGLY.

We would keep pounding yam the same way until Oyibo man made pounding machine for us
We would keep fishing the same way until,
We would keep farming the same way using old backbreaking labor techniques until,
We would keep shelling egusi seeds the same way with our bare hands until,

All an unemployed youth/graduate needed to do is put his brain to work to create an egusi shelling machine for example and he would be a millionaire selling his product and create jobs That is how innovations are done in other places.

ose o jare, like the quote below me said, our culture is soooooooooooooo anti-change its ridiculous. We have been using the same techniques for thousands of years, this is where the educational system has to step in to change that. The system should force kids right from a young age to be inventive and creative. For example, in university, there is nothing that stops an engineering teacher from giving his first year student a project to invent an egusi shelling machine or a final year student from inventing a yam pounding machine. This is how we solve our local problems.

the greatest asset of a nation is its manpower.
It doesn't matter how much ground Nigerians are breaking outside Nigeria,
The question is How does this feed back into the nation?

So far people have mentioned EVERYTHING that is wrong with our Educational system
and it is the truth. Our system doesn't allow for proper thinking and an actual education.
The environment is so anti-change it is ridiculous. still, this shouldn't be the begining and end of us.

Thanks for the perspective my guy. It doesn't matter what some of our people in other countries, what matters is what impact our educational system having on our economy.

warrior01:
Thanks, really tired of all this Naija bashing thread as if we've even made use of the 'little education ' we had.

WOW! SO WE SHOULD SIT BACK AND CLAP HANDS FOR OURSELVES AND PAT OURSELVES ON THE BACK FOR A JOB WELL DONE ABI? When i see a country like Israel with only 6 million people and hardly anything else become so developed and lead most of the world in science and technology and i see our own Nigerians with all the schooling and i am asking myself the question IN WHAT WAY HAS EDUCATION CONTRIBUTED TO OUR SOCIETY? Now everybody is making me out to be the bad guy. Na wa o, you people are real enemies of progress. The aforementioned Israeli's realized that there small population was a huge disadvantage to them so therefore they decided to get the very best out of every citizen in there country and this meant spending HEAVILY on education especially in the field of scientific research (hence the ridiculous number of Nobel Prize winners) and that's the reason why they are developed.

Education is CRUCIAL to development in any country but yet Nigeria with all the "education" we've had we are still an under-developed country which makes me ask the question, of what use is education to most Nigerians? where are Nigeria's Broadcom's, Genentech's, Pfizer's and co.? we have none. This companies would not exist without advances in sciences from academia. If an educational system cannot develop the country, then of what use is it?. This are valid questions that we should ask ourselves, yet you folks are all up in arms that i am anti-Nigerian. Arrant nonsense.

By the way, did anyone see Inception? People are saying its a classic.

AjanleKoko:
So literature is now useless? Economics?

Abeg you just dey rake jare. Argue with objectivity, not with sentiments.

Tell me this, does literature produce companies like Intel, Microsoft, Apple, AirBus, GlaxoSmithKline uhn? This are companies that produce jobs and add REAL value to the economy. Tell me if economists have contributed (i am not saying that they have not contributed anything) things on the same level as the other scientists. Wasn't it this your hallowed economists who led to this world economic recession we are in? In fact apart from John Nash's Game Theory, Friedman and Keynes. I can't think of anything groundbreaking in the field of economics in decades.

As bad as our educational system is, we still produce quality graduates who represent Nigeria well around the world. I work with Indians and Chinese (the ones from India and China, not the ones in Europe) on a daily basis, and I can tell you, I don't see what cannot be achieved by Nigerians. Nigerians one-on-one are smarter than those guys.

Please show me what research that of note that any Nigerian has published  o, at least na Indianswey no sabi book na them full here.
http://www.jstor.org/journals/00368075.html 
http://arxiv.org/
http://www.sciencemag.org/
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/journal/00043702
http://www.ieee.org/portal/site/mainsite/menuitem.818c0c39e85ef176fb2275875bac26c8/index.jsp?&pName=corp_level1&path=pubs/transactions&file=index.xml&xsl=generic.xsl

Not taking anything away from Indians though, they have achieved a lot on the world stage. But so have we.
Look at that list of Nobel laureates again. Nigeria has just one: Wole Soyinka. 'Incredible' India has nine, three of which are not really Indians: Ronald Ross (Briton), Mother Theresa (born in Skopje, Macedonia), and Rudyard Kipling (Briton). What about Britain and the US? 117 and 320 respectively. China has just 5. I'm sure you're reading about all those Nigerians breaking records at Imperial, Stanford, Harvard and the rest. Some of those guys will be listed as British or Americal laureates in 40-50 years, mark my words. And they're products of the wretched Nigerian educational system.

OGA, i am talking about Nobel Prizes in the sciences not useless categories like Peace and Literature. I am talking about Physics, Chemistry, Medicine/Physiology as this are the only important categories. This are the ones that actually add meat to the economy (with all due respect to economics).

excellent, excellent insightful topic. everyone should ask themselves this question.

example the Lebanese community school at yaba. mthe studeny spend at least 3 to 4 hours each day playing basket ball rather than reading. the sch enviroment is ok, but how effective is the teaching and learning?

Don't mind them jare, instead of playing, there fellow students in China are studying like there lives depended on it. In Japan and in the USA right from primary school, students are giving science projects to do. They are told to build or to create something, this brings out the creative attributes in them. We on the other hand are told to keep cramming for exams. I remember when i was in secondary school, when we took P.E (physical education). We spent 98% of the time in class copying notes and cramming the "steps on how to spike the volleyball" or the "types of grip to hold a table tennis bat when serving". They all had 5 steps each which we had to cram. I remember that most topics always had "definitions, advantages (merits), disadvantages (demerits)" and we had to memorize all this for our exams. I also remember that i spent over 50% of my time in classes in naija copying notes which is a huuuuuuge waste of time. In yanki, they give them textbooks to read from that is why it is extremely important to have good world class textbooks to learn from and not from some no-name scientists or publishers that no one has ever heard of. This is much better than having to listen to teachers "dictate" notes from their note books.

aigbofa,
Those guys you mentioned are extreeeeeeemely few and far between. Nigeria has a population of 150 million, if we had an excellent educational system like the israeli's and other western and asian countries we should be reaping the dividends.


Ajanlekeko,
Are you serious? do you know how excellent the Indian educational system is? you can't even begin to compare our useless "government comprehension grammar schools" to their's. There university system is formidable that there average students go to Stanford and MIT's and dominate. Haven't you heard of IIT (Indian Institute of Technology) before or Delhi University? please educate yourself jare.
https://www.nairaland.com/nigeria/topic-154714.0.html

Aigbofa:
Davidif, It is true that some Nigerians are silently breaking new grounds especially in the West. The fact that they are not loud like our politicians does not mean they don't exist.
My only prayer is that somehow our politicians can find a way to harness their experience in verious fields to benefit Nigeria.
They do exist, they just don't make too much noise. It's only the empty barrels in Abuja that makes the most noise.

Please, would you be kind to name any of them because i don't see them in scientific journals or technology magazines. If they were "silently" breaking new ground, they would at least have to be in those journals afterall journals are the outlets of publishing one's research. Afterall, there work will speak for themselves.

AjanleKoko:
@Poster,
It's only a lazy workman that blames his tools. Why blame the system for our personal failures?
There are lots of Nigerians in the diaspora, breaking new grounds. Most of these people passed through the Nigerian educational system at some point, and somehow did not end it there. If someone else is able to do it, then any of us who fails only has his or herself to blame, not the system.

Nobody tied our hands from shaking off the vestiges of our so-called stinking educational system, and forging ahead to innovate. We're the ones that are not innovating. It's all in our hands. What about you, poster, innovated anything lately?

WOW! first of all where do i even begin to start? Is it your extremely erroneous statement that "there are a lot of Nigerians in the the diaspora breaking new ground". What ground are you talking about? I read science journals and try to follow the latest in science and technology and i hear nevr hear of this so called Nigerians "breaking new grounds". Tell me what "ground breaking" discovery that Nigerians have ever come up with and don't enven mention Emeka Emeaghwali (or whatever his name is). What Nobel Prize winners have we produced in the field of the sciences? None. When Nigerians start producing there googles, intel, twitters, merck, qualcomms and co. then come talk to me. Till then don't come here and be talking nonsense as if your are Albert Einstein or as if your name is all over every research jounal in the world.

look at this. when are we going to start having our own intel and sun [sun microsystems]? http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-11280200

hercules07:
I am glad you put education in quotes, let us not kid ourselves, what we get in Nigeria is not education, it is literacy classes, this is more relevant in the sciences and engineering.

thank you o jare, you hit the nail right on the head. It should be called literacy classes.

Here is a list of top 10 innovators in different countries round the world. Is there any Nigerian or even an African for that matter on the list?


http://www.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,2017050_2017049_2017048,00.html

What's the purpose of education if it cannot produce any benefit to society? I am asking this question because despite the fact that a lot of Nigerians are "educated" Nigeria is still a poor country. This means that the educational system is not adding value to the economy through the creation of jobs. The main culprit here is the Nigerian educational system. The Nigerian educational system is one of the worst in the world. Our educational system is not producing innovators? but only people who know how to pass exams by cramming?
At best our school system (the wdely regarded private schools like Loyola Jesuit and co.) it only produces crammers who pass there exams by writing 20 fullscap sheets of information on the exam but can hardly solve real world societal problems.


It seems that the mentality of the policy makers just like most Nigerians is very skewed. They just like most Nigerians think that being educated means being able to speak English properly and use big words in the dictionary to impress people thereby looking down on people who make grammatical errors while regarding others that can't even speak english as "local", "omo-ita's" or "agbero's".


Here is a list of top 10 innovators in different countries round the world. Is there any Nigerian or even an African for that matter on the list?


http://www.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,2017050_2017049_2017048,00.html

My goodness! this thread got to page 86! na wa o.

medjai:
actually, its none of them. Yakubu Aiyegbeni is the first and I think only African to have scored a hatrick in the UCL. That was back in his Maccabi Haifa days. I think it was against Man United. The guy has a whole lot of firsts. He is also the first African to reach the 100 goal mark in the EPL

I saw the highlight of that game when it happened. I really didn't know it was him, i would have thought it would be George Weah or someone else.

Age would catch up to them in the final stretch of the season as all of them would start dropping from injuries.

yeah, but i could have streamed it online, not spend 10 dollars on it.

Finally, the law at work. Now if only the judiciary would go after the executive and the legislative arms of govt. Nigeria would be a much better place.