Seeking active ways to avert unemployment
ILLOVO – An intense discussion seeking to address youth unemployment and job creation in more practical ways was conducted at the GIBS auditorium.
The ticking time bomb of unemployment paints a bleak future for the youth in South Africa. A vigorous discussion with leading experts on the state of education and job creation in the country was carried out at Gordon Institute of Business Science (Gibs).
According to director of the Gibs Think Tank, Rabbi Gideon Pogrund, the topic of the night’s discussion was ‘urgent and vital’ seeing as the youth lack the required skills to contribute in the economic growth and development of the country.
Host and SABC economics editor Thandeka Gqubule-Mbeki steered the conversation against the backdrop of the looming recession and asked the speakers to elaborate on matters that needed to be addressed. Professor Piet Naudé, dean of Stellenbosch Business School said the role of business schools is to create spaces where people’s voices can be heard in a non-threatening environment.
The professor went on to add that all big social changes started with changes in thinking.
“Power of thought is essential but it has to be matched with implementation. The way to go is not to change Section 25, which is the land crisis, but rather the crooked education system.”
Group CEO of Investec and co-convener of Youth Employment Scheme, Stephen Koseff said the scheme has strong support from the government so it will happen. He said, “The critical part is how to actually create jobs that currently don’t exist and how to match skills for them if they don’t even exist.”
Founder of Future Nations Schools, Sizwe Nxasana said that 90 per cent of the country’s curriculum is academic with a lot of children dropping out and in turn contributing to the unemployment statistics.
“Our children need skills so we need to change our teaching and learning environment. There is an ongoing debate about what to take out of our current education system seeing that children nowadays can Google some things they are taught.”
Nxasana emphasised that politicians had to stop changing policies to suit their terms of office and moreover be more focused on implementing positive-impacting policies instead of just writing them down.
Details: Gordon Institute of Business and Science www.gibs.co.za
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