Determining the Employability Skills in Polytechnic Curriculum in Ghana

Abstract

Polytechnics worldwide have the mandate to produce the manpower needs of most industry and also to make students entrepreneurial, equipped with the needed skills to be self-reliant through technical and vocational education and training for sustainable development. The development of curriculum for all the HND programmes seems to be retarding and requires immediate attention to make them relevant and industry-friendly. This paper seeks to review the computer science curriculum of polytechnics in Ghana to determine if students are adequately being prepared with employability skills to build human capital, create jobs and raise labor productivity. An analytical review of computer science curriculum of seven polytechnics was used. The finding shows that the computer science curriculum was skewed more toward theoretical and technical skills with very minimal hands-on industry training due to lack of infrastructure, human resource, lack of collaboration between lecturers and industry, among others in most polytechnics. In conclusion this paper recommends a round table discussion between stakeholders such as NAPTEX (and other regulatory bodies), industry players and polytechnics (lecturers) in the design and implementation (course delivery) of the computer science curriculum to ensure employability of HND graduates.