Opinion
7 Reasons Why Degree Holders Are Poor By Mallam Mamuda Kabir Dutsinma
7 REASONS WHY DEGREE HOLDERS ARE POOR
Written by
*MALAM MAMUDA KABIR DUTSINMA*
1. I have a very painful truth to dish out to graduates out there: Your degree or certificate is not the cure to poverty; the cure to poverty is your ability to see and seize opportunities. In this article, the word P.O.O.R means: Passing Over Opportunities Repeatedly.
2. Dear Graduates, if somebody offers you an amazing opportunity, but you are not sure you can do it, say yes then learn how to do it later!, never should you say you don’t know. School rewards people for their memory. Life rewards people for their creativity and ability to solve problems. School rewards caution; life rewards daring. School hails those who live by the rules. Life exalts those who break the rules and set new ones.
3. Being on top of your class does not necessarily guarantee that you will be at the top of life. The world is filled with poor graduates but rich opportunists! Kevin Ngo once said, “If you don’t make the time to work on creating the life you want, you’re eventually going to be forced to spend a lot of time dealing with a life you don’t want”.
4. Your certificates and degrees are meant to help you garner the experience and expertise needed to fulfill your dreams; they are not your destination! I have watched pitiably many graduates with degrees and certificates languishing in poverty looking for jobs that don’t even exist while people with keen eyes for opportunities reach the pinnacle of success in the most unlikeliest of ways.
5. Do you have a graduate or degree holder around you that is poor? I bet you have as they are everywhere! I have a very painful truth to dish out to graduates out there: Your degree or certificate is not the cure to poverty; the cure to poverty is your ability to see and seize opportunities.
BASICALLY, there are seven (7) reasons why degree holders are poor.
1. THEY DON’T THINK BEYOND THEIR CERTIFICATES
Albert Einstein said, “Education is not the learning of facts, but the training of the mind to think.” Have you ever heard creativity term “Think outside the box”? One of the major reasons why most graduates are poor is simply because they can’t see and think beyond their certificates.
I have seen engineering students work as bankers. I have seen medical doctors with great skills in web and graphic designs. I have seen lawyers that are very dexterous with finances. The list is endless!
The basic truth of life is that the skills that are needed to be much sought after and become more successful in life are not really found within the walls of the classrooms. Your certificate is just a proof that you are teachable, it does not suggest what you are totally capable of doing. You are full of possibilities when you think beyond your degrees and certificates.
2. THEY PRIORITIZE THEIR CERTIFICATES MORE THAN THEIR GIFTS AND TALENTS
I have often advised some of my colleagues, never to leave their gifts dormant while pursuing and hunting for jobs with their certificates. There must be a complementary balance in the pursuit of your passion and in the search for jobs.
Everybody is gifted for something, but the winning edge comes from our ability to work on our gifts and bless the world with it. The very best way to develop yourself is in the direction of your natural talents and interest. In order to live a fulfilled and impactful life, we need to work harder on our gift than our job. We need to discover our gift, develop it, and sell it. Don’t bury your TALENT with your certificates.
3. THEIR CERTIFICATES PREPARE THEM FOR A WORLD THAT NO LONGER EXIST
It has been found that most of the skills taught in schools are becoming obsolete in the present world. The world has changed a lot, and so are people’s need! It is imperative to know that the present form of university education does not prepare students for the future.
Graduates are becoming endangered species in the face of a changing world. Our archaic methods and approaches of learning are preparing graduates for a world that no longer exist, as we are churning out degree holders every year with certificates that have face value but no intrinsic worth. Most learning institutions are filled up with lecturers and pseudo-educators with lecture notes, methods and approaches that have lost relevance in a changing world.
4. THEY KNOW LESS ABOUT THEMSELVES BUT MORE ABOUT THINGS
Certificates and degrees don’t reveal people to themselves; they at most measure our IQ (Intelligent Quotient). I have often tell people that there is no Recovery without Discovery. A poor man is simply someone that has not discovered himself.
The more you discover yourself, the more you realize the treasures that are hidden deep within you. We carry inside ourselves latent treasures that can only be unveiled through self-discovery.
5. CERTIFICATES AND DEGREES CAN KILL INITIATIVES
Degrees and certificates can close up your minds to ideas while initiatives open it up. If you are not careful, your degrees and certificates can close up your mind. The purpose of education is to keep your mind perpetually opened towards limitless possibilities!
Fred Smith saw an opportunity for overnight delivery of anything anywhere in the USA, and ultra- fast delivery anywhere in the world, FedEx was born. It will be interesting to know that Fred Smith got a grade “C” in a Yale economics class for an idea that the professor belittled as unworkable.
Fred Smith’s company became the first American business to make over ten billion dollars in annual profit. Beginning with just 186 packages delivered the first night, FedEx now delivers in over two hundred countries using over 6,030 aircraft, 46,000 vehicles and 141,000 employees.
6. DEGREES AND CERTIFICATES POSITION YOU TO LOOK FOR JOBS AND NOT FOR OPPORTUNITIES
Our certificates and degrees prepare graduates to look for jobs and not open our eyes to life-changing opportunities. You are not poor because you don’t have a job; you are poor because you are not seeing and seizing opportunities.
Being POOR is simply Passing Over Opportunities Repeatedly! What keeps people ahead in life is not their education or degrees, it is simply the opportunity that they seized. Jobs may be scarce but not opportunities.
As long as there is a problem to be solved, there will always be opportunities. It is a waste of our education, exposure, and experiences if after we graduate from school, all we think about is searching for a job. An enlightened and educated mind should be able to see and seize opportunities.
7. CERTIFICATES AND DEGREES PREPARE PEOPLE TO LOOK FOR SECURITY AND NOT TO TAKE RISKS
We must be willing to make mistakes and take breakthrough risks. Taking risks and learning from mistakes help us in knowing what works and what does not! When Thomas Edison was being questioned by a mischievous journalist on how he felt for having failed for 999 times before getting the idea of the light bulb, his response stunned the whole world when he confidently said, “I have not failed 999 times, I have only learned 999 ways of how not to make a light bulb”.
Many graduates and degree holders are becoming progressively poor because the skills required in the modern world to get rich are not taught in schools and institutions. By 2025, we’ll lose over five million jobs to automation. This means that future jobs will look vastly different by the time many people graduate from the university.
Future jobs will involve KNOWLEDGE PRODUCTION/CREATION and innovation, and people that are only equipped with skills found in the classroom will definitely be a misfit in an ever-changing world. Skills like critical thinking, creativity, people’s skill, STEM skills (e.g Coding), complex problem-solving skills etc. are central to living a more comprehensive and productive life.
Therefore, in conclusion, My humble and candid advice to graduates and students in institutions is to think wide, deep, and outside the box. Take volunteer jobs, and don’t be afraid to navigate fields that are different from your field of learning. Your future career will require you to pull information from many different fields to come up with creative solutions to future problems.
Start by reading as much as you can about anything and everything that interests you. Once you get to college, consider double majoring or minoring in completely different fields. Trust me, it’ll pay off in the long run.
Don’t limit yourself to the classroom. Do something practical. Take a leadership position. Start a business and fail; that’s a better entrepreneurship. Contest an election and lose. It will teach you something political science will not teach you. Attend a seminar. Read books outside the scope of your course.
Think less of becoming an excellent student, but think more of becoming an excellent person. Don’t make the classroom your world, but make the world your classroom. Step forward and try something extra. Invest in something you believe! Real financial security and freedom is not in your job, but in your passion, gifts, talents, and your ability to see and seize opportunities.
Oluwarinu Oduala has expressed disappointment that the Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, froze her account just because she lent her voice during the EndSARS protest.
On November 5, the apex bank secured a court order to freeze the account of 19 promoters of the #EndSARS protests.
In a Twitter thread shared on her handle on Monday night, Rinu who is a member of the Lagos State Panel of Judicial Inquiry probing cases of police brutality and the alleged shooting of #EndSARS protesters at the Lekki toll gate, said the recent action of the Central Bank of Nigeria is a betrayal of the supposed peace-making efforts of the government.
Read her Twitter thread below.
”I am part of a generation of Nigerians, who have lived most of their adult lives under ‘democratic’ rule yet I wake up this morning feeling there is no difference between the Nigeria I grew up in and the Nigeria my parents grew up in. The sacrifices of the democrats, who bravely stood on the June 12 mandate to bring our democracy to life seem to be in vain. Ironically many are serving in this government and ruling party.
Everywhere I turn, I am told that I should be ‘grateful’ for a democracy that lives were lost, I should be thankful that I have a voice and I can speak up for myself and my peers. But how can I be grateful when young men and women disappear every day, some killed recklessly without cause, while others get scarred for life—physically, emotionally, or both.
When we began to protest it was because young Nigerians decided to speak up.
We spoke up – not because we wanted to overthrow the government but because we wanted the police to stop killing us. We did not carry arms, or incite any insurrection. Our only weapon was peaceful protest enshrined in Section 40 of our 1999 Constitution. At every point we maintained calm and educated our followers – reiterating throughout the protests that we were not there to fight the government but to ask for change and to follow through to make sure that change was effected.
We believed that somehow we would be spared from the systemic violence and breakdown of social order that was the direct result of the government’s actions. Unfortunately we were mistaken.
I was volunteered to receive donations to our cause by Nigerians at home and abroad who felt helpless to personally protest but believed they could make a difference through financial sacrifices. Such was the passion of average Nigerians to contribute how best they can to the #EndSARS cause, they found my personal account number and sent in what they could sacrifice towards the cause. Some people even sent as little ?500; all they could spare towards the cause. To have their sacrifices rubbished by the government and their motivations questioned is disheartening because the raised funds including over N200,000 naira gathered from my business were meant to be disbursed to attend to the medical bills of injured protesters.
We called for among other things, a probe into the killings and torture of people and the government agreed by setting up judicial panels. In order to assure young people of the independence and fairness of the panel I took up the role as a youth representative at the detriment of my education, personal life and family. I did this to make peace. I did to ensure our young people understood that the only way to create a better and safer Nigeria is to do things lawfully. Why am I still being targeted for lending the government my goodwill?
I am not part of Nigeria’s political or business elite—I have no relatives in government or family members with enough wealth to sway powerful individuals. I am just an ordinary young Nigerian. I study, selling hoodies and other clothing for ?5,000 to pay my school fees. I also do the odd bit of freelancing, taking on some brand influencing work to ensure my family doesn’t suffer. Somehow, however, my existence threatens my government, the fact that I have a voice is enough for them to try to silence me.
In the Nigeria I am fighting for, it wouldn’t matter that I am a child of nobody coming from the average Nigerian home. The Nigeria I am fighting for is one that prioritizes every voice, protects every inalienable right, even mine.
I decided to use the only currency I have, my voice to speak up against extrajudicial killings, torture, extortion and unjust harassment that is still happening in a democratic nation in the 21st century! The government also agreed that reform is inevitable and promised us they were going to listen so why punish the same people that are speaking up?
I am not afraid—I am only disappointed that this country will treat me this way.
Nigeria is all I have, and I have a right to demand that it works for all of us, not just those with influence, wealth, or a government position.
In a country that people have been voiceless for a long time, people holding the government accountable is being seen as too much? How can we ensure that this sort of thing will encourage people to build a new Nigeria? A Nigeria that will be filled with accountable government officials, where all forms of oppressions and injustice is a thing of the past. How do you expect me as a part of the future of this country to still believe in a country who thinks they have the right through CBN to freeze my account for no just cause?
This is not fair. But we will make it fair. Otherwise, there is no future for my generation and the generations to come.
Lest you forget, #EndSARS !”
As prescribed in the U.S. Constitution, American presidents are elected not directly by the people, but by the people’s electors. The Electoral College was created by the framers of the U.S. Constitution as an alternative to electing the president by popular vote or by Congress. If it were by popular vote or who gets the most votes, Hillary Clinton would have won in 2016 and Joe Biden would have been declared the winner by now. Biden has also received the most votes of any president in American history. Whoever reaches the 270 electoral votes will be officially declared the winner. In this system, Trump still has a chance of winning.
The United States Electoral College is a name used to describe the official 538 Presidential electors who come together every four years during the presidential election to give their official votes for President and Vice President of the United States.The Constitution leaves states to decide how electors will vote. It began In 1804, 12th Amendment to the Constitution made sure that electors designate their votes for president and vice president, but the 12th Amendment leaves in place a tie breaking system established by the Constitution by which the House of Representatives breaks a tie on presidential electoral votes and the Senate.
The election of the president of the United States is a two-step process. First, voters cast ballots on Election Day in each state. In nearly every state, the candidate who gets the most votes wins the “electoral votes” for that state, and gets that number of voters (or “electors”
in the “Electoral College.” In the Electoral College system, each state gets a certain number of electors based on its total number of representatives in Congress. Each elector casts one electoral vote following the general election; there are a total of 538 electoral votes. The candidate that gets more than half (270) wins the election.
What happens if no candidate gets enough electoral votes?Pursuant to the 12th Amendment, the House of Representatives is required to go into session immediately after the counting of the electoral votes to vote for president if no candidate for the office receives a majority of the electoral votes. … The House continues balloting until it elects a president.
Who sits on the Electoral College? The president and vice president of the United States are elected by the Electoral College, which consists of 538 electors from the fifty states and Washington, D.C. Electors are selected state-by-state, as determined by the laws of each state.
Addendum: Electoral College is a system born of compromise deeply rooted in America’s slavery foundation. I will explain this in my subsequent post.
Thank you.
Source: Maria Ude Nwachi
https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=2862531247403118&id=100009388131283
Our country is on fire and the causes of the flames are a combination of the activities of the government in their attempts to sabotage a righteous movement and the unhinged reaction of inflamed youths who are currently on a rampage. These understandably angry and incensed people assume that the destruction of private property is “fighting the system”.
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I am truly bothered by the huge amount of destruction of public and especially private property taking place everywhere.
While stationed at the gate to my estate yesterday as we were trying to prevent hoodlums from gaining access, a woman attempted to leave the estate in the heat of the riots. She had been told her shop had been destroyed and all her goods stolen.
We had to work hard to prevent her from proceeding to her shop I saw the grief on her face. I knew this woman has no other source of livelihood. She and her dependents would now be in financial ruin. I hope she doesn’t act in desperation. Less has led to suicide in the past.
This lady isn’t a part of the government, nor is she guilty of any of the injustices that we are calling on the government to correct. She is just someone who is trying to make a living. She is a wife, a mother, a grandmother, and a sister. She has groaned with all of us under the yoke of bad government. Now she has been further punished for crimes she did not commit Her life will never be the same – ever again To be clear, the reaction of the government to the protests is disgusting, shocking, and unconscionable. I will not lessen the gravity of this by adding “but”. I will respectfully wait till the next paragraph to continue.
The fight must continue but it must also be fought through righteous means Civil disobedience and peaceful protests are more effective than riots If things continue in their current trajectory, we will lose our moral standing and the government will win the moral battle. Our grievance is not with banks, shopping malls, or any other businesses.
Our grievance is with the government.
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Remember that this is the same year that the covid -19 has devasted the economy and caused large unemployment Think about the effect of continuing on this path of destruction. Think of your jobs and the jobs of your family members. THERE IS TOMORROW MY PEOPLE. We must think of TOMORROW.
Do we not all share in the yoke of police brutality Do we not all share in the perils of bad leadership?
Our solution cannot be worse than the problem. We MUST Not contribute to the problems. Remember, one of our major grievances is corruption. What is happening now is also corruption. IT is the corruption of what was until 20/10/20 a righteous struggle that was garnering international support.
The response to police brutality and corruption in our government CANNOT BE riots, looting, pillaging and killing of police officers.
The hand that gave soft drinks to the police officers did more for this struggle than the hand that struck them.
We grieve for all who have lost their lives in this struggle. Protesters and Police officers alike.
#STOP THE VIOLENCE. CONTINUE THE PRORESTS
I am calling on all patriotic Nigerians to calm nerves and to engage with the youth through any medium available to them.
This struggle must not be prematurely aborted.
The youth must be guided even as they lead.
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