DIRECTORATE FOR ENTREPRENEURSHIP AND GENERAL STUDIES (DE&GS)
Introduction:
Welcome to the Directorate for Entrepreneurship And General Studies (DE&GS), National Open University of Nigeria (NOUN). The Directorate services NOUN students in Entrepreneurship and General Studies (GST) with a focus on creativity, innovation and life-long learning.
The Directorate for Entrepreneurship and General Studies (DE&GS) was established on the 11th of May 2017 as a Centre for Entrepreneurship and General Studies (CE&GS). Based on the activities of the Centre for the nomenclatures was changed by the University Management from Centre for Entrepreneurship and General Studies (CE&GS) to Directorate for Entrepreneurship and General Studies (DE&GS) on the 21st May 2019. First and foremost, the Directorate being an arm of the University services NOUN students are acquiring general skills that will lead to lifelong learning and employability. Secondly, the Directorate provides services for the general community through training, consultancy, and research.
Therefore, the mandate of the Directorate is to inculcate lifelong learning skills, create entrepreneurs by inculcating entrepreneurial skills, helping the students to discover their creativity and innovation, take initiative, utilise possibilities, take risks and responsibilities.
Vision:
To become the foremost incubation hub that gives opportunity to everyone to elicit creative and innovative ideas
Mission:
To provide functional cost-effective flexible learning which adds life-long value to the entrepreneurial initiative, creativity, research, and innovation
Motto:
Explore. Develop. Deliver.
Objectives:
Specifically, the objectives are:
- Acquisition, development, and inculcation of the proper value-orientation for the survival of an individual and society
- To prepare the students for a post-university life with opportunities for job creation and entrepreneurial skills.
- To promote the culture of entrepreneurship among NOUN students
- To identify students with creative and innovative ideas for start-ups
- To produce graduates who will be capable to communicate effectively
- To develop the intellectual capacities of the students to understand, appreciate, and promote peaceful co-existence.
- To produce graduates with broad knowledge of the Nigerian Nation and people with a view to inculcating in their mutual understanding and patriotism
- To expose graduates of the National Open University of Nigeria to the rudiment of ICT for computer literacy and the ability to live usefully in this ICT age
General Philosophy/ Goal:
The Directorate has two main functions- to build soft skills into students by exposing them to general courses and to prepare them to be self-reliant; hence the focus on entrepreneurship and general studies. Therefore, the goals are to produce:
- Graduates with some value addition over their field of study for being self-reliant.
- Well-rounded, morally and intellectually capable graduates with vision and entrepreneurial skills in an environment of peace and social cohesiveness
About NOUN Entrepreneurship Education and Incubation Centres:
Over the years the federal government of Nigeria has floated several programmes to strengthened Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) and to encourage youth in entrepreneurship. Some of such programmes are Nigerian Industrial Development Bank Ltd (NIDB), Nigerian Bank for Commerce and Industry (NBCI), Small and Medium Enterprises Equity Investment Scheme (SMEEIS), and Youth Entrepreneurship Development Programme (YEDP) which was established on 15th March 2016. Despite the several programmes, youths have less presence in entrepreneurship and unemployment is on the increase.
To meet the need of the Nigerian society, the National Universities Commission (NUC) introduced entrepreneurship into Nigeria university curriculum. Even at that the teaching of entrepreneurship at the university level, it did not have much impact on the youth. In compliance with the NUC directive and its provision that each university has about 40% liberty to review the minimum benchmark; The National Open University of Nigeria established the Centre for Entrepreneurship and General Studies in 11th May 2017 and was upgraded to Directorate for Entrepreneurship and General Studies in 21st May 2019. With the mandate of the university, the Directorate carried out a study to identify the gaps. It was found that most university students are not interested in vocational training skills such as barbing, hairdressing, fishing, tailoring, carpentry etc rather they want opportunities where they can demonstrate their creative and innovative ideas and skills. Also, the findings revealed that the country needs creative and innovative entrepreneurs to grow the economy. Most of the corps members who acquired vocational skills during service were found not to use the skills after the service year. It was also found that most trainees who were monetarily empowered through government-organised skill pieces of training do not continue with the skill rather such monies are diverted to some other things. From the result of the interview held with some of the trainees and serving corps and those who have completed their service year, the majority do not know where their ability lies. Some have the view that participating in an empowerment scheme is an opportunity to share from the national cake. Therefore, what is NOUN doing differently?
Based on the findings, the National Open University of Nigeria (NOUN) developed a framework that gave the opportunity to NOUN students to demonstrate their creative and innovative ideas. NOUN entrepreneurship prepares student entrepreneurs by taking them through entrepreneurship education and mentorship with a focus on meeting the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) towards achieving the 2030 Agenda for sustainable development and beyond.
During entrepreneurship education, the students learn how to:
• Discover and direct their innate abilities for economic viability
• Improve on their creativity and innovation
• Direct their passion for their new discoveries
• Manage creativity and innovation
• Relate with other people and the society for peaceful co-existence
The students’ creative and innovative ideas are directed towards the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). To make it manageable during enterprise idea presentations, incubation, and mentor-ship, the SDGs are grouped into four categories:
i. Well-being: This covers Goals 1, 3, 4, 5, 10 & 16
ii. Infrastructure: This covers Goals 2, 6, 7, 8, 9, & 11
iii. Natural Environment: This covers Goals 13, 14, & 15
iv. Partnership: This covers Goal 17
Students’ creative and innovative ideas are not only focused on products. It also covers social entrepreneurs and researchers.
In NOUN, 200 and 300 level students go through entrepreneurship education. At the last semester of 300 level, students present their enterprise ideas which is accompanied by a business plan. As at December 2019, 12,502 students presented their enterprise ideas across the seven incubation centres in the country. Those with creative and innovative ideas were selected and enrolled on the incubation centres. 188 incubatees were enrolled in the year 2019. This started student incubation in NOUN. The centre has both resident and non-resident incubatees. Those with creative and innovative ideas create enterprise for others to imitate or use. NOUN differentiates between a businessman and an entrepreneur.
The Directorate also renders service to non-NOUN students by:
• Training Micro, Small and Medium Entrepreneurs
• Training individuals on creative thinking and innovation
• Providing access for loan opportunities for start-ups and growth
• Providing mentorship for start-ups
NOUN Incubation Centres Competitive Advantage:
• Incubate students to start-up
• Provide mentor-ship during incubation and a year follow-up after start-up
• Provide equipment and facilities for practice
• Active involvement in innovative research
• Protect the rights of innovators
• Collaboration with Industries, Research Institutes, governments and non-government agencies for guidance and mentorship
• Guide the business registration with Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC)
• Extends hand of fellowship to the community
• Provide an opportunity to all trainees (students and non-students) to obtain loans for start-up or grow their business
• Provide support in business plan development
Fig 1: Administrative Structure
Mentorship:
Incubation Centres are created to provide opportunities for students with creative and innovative ideas for mentorship and start-ups. The mentorship process begins once a student has been admitted into the incubation Centre. NOUN has seven incubation centres across the geo-political zones in Bogoro, Maiduguri, Kano, Abuja, Enugu, Uyo and Lagos. The admission is not limited to students with innovation in production but to all innovations including research and social entrepreneurship. There are some students who have innovative ideas that call for further research; these set of incubatees are supported by providing technical support in the research and collaborates with other bodies where contain equipment that may be required for the study.
The incubation period for the students is between 1-3years. They start their incubation period at 400 level. This gives the opportunity to have a good start-up at graduation.
There is adequate documentation of admission and progress of incubates. The time of students’ graduation from the incubation period is not uniform. The incubation period varied depending on their innovation. Students’ graduation is launched with start-ups.
The post-incubation period last for one year; where the Coordinators of each Incubation Centres follow up on the graduate progress to ascertain stability before the final release.
Activities in the Incubation Centres:
- Educate the Incubatees
- Development of innovation Idea
- Market Research
- Business Management Process
- Human Relations
- Marketing Strategies
- Financial Literacy
- Business Communication
- Record Keeping
- e-Business and Digital Marketing
- Business Sustainability
- Statutory Agencies in Business
- Writing Business Plan/ Proposal for sponsorship
- Business Registration
- Guide the business registration with Corporate Affairs Commission
- Provide equipment and facilities for practice
- Active involvement in innovation research
- Provide expertise guidance
- Idea Simulation
- Protect the rights of innovators
- Start-ups
- Collaboration with industries and Research Institutes for guidance and mentorship
- Collaboration with governments and non-government agencies
Students are mentored through the following methods:
- One-on-one mentoring. The first mentor in this instance is the Incubation Centre Coordinator who guides the incubatees according to individual needs. Secondly, incubatees are attached to successful entrepreneurs in their areas on an individual basis to guide them. Meetings are organised where they can meet one-on-one.
- Group mentoring. A mentor is matched with a cohort who has a similar idea. One-on-one and distance mentoring are combined to achieve this.
- Distance mentoring. Mentors are sourced across the globe to mentor incubatees. This is done using both synchronous and asynchronous techniques. The synchronous is done virtually using the university Learning Management System (LMS) with a schedule. For asynchronous, mails, text, and the university LMS are combined.
The centre is involved in the following mentorship types:
- Entrepreneurship Development
- Financial Management
- Business Growth
- Business Management
- Entrepreneurial Guidance
- Research Guidance
Resources:
- Entrepreneurship and Innovation
- Business Creation and Growth
Events & Networks:
• NOUN Young Entrepreneurs Exhibitions
- NOUN Young Entrepreneurs in AYE in 2017
- NOUN Young Entrepreneurs in Nile University Exhibition 2018
- NOUN Young Entrepreneur in Tony Elumelu Foundation, 2018
- NOUN Young Entrepreneurs in Nile University Exhibition 2019
- NOUN Young Entrepreneurs in AYE in 2019
- NOUN Young Entrepreneurs Exhibition in NOUN H/Q 2019
• NOUN Entrepreneurship Summit
Achievements:
- Set up seven Incubation Centres. At least one in each geographical zone.
- Developed entrepreneurship education model that brings interaction among the Directorate, students, faculty, industry, and agencies.
- A developed platform for virtual entrepreneurship education and practice.
- Have 188 incubatees that are been mentored and followed up at different levels as of 2019.
- Have successfully changed the entrepreneurial mindset of the students. Most of the students now think entrepreneurially irrespective of their course of study. Many have testified to this. We have few video clips in the gallery.
- Two of the students received awards. Bosede Alabi in 2018 received a one-million-naira award from Tony Elumelu Foundation as a start-up for her business plan and in 2019, Obinna F. Nwanuo received an award of proficiency in Digital Media and Entertainment at the Nile University Entrepreneurship Fair. It was given by the Director of Abuja Enterprise Agency.
- The university through the directorate has been engaged by NIRSAL as Entrepreneurship Development Institute
- Records of students’ diversification of creative and innovative ideas by given the opportunity to present their business ideas and participate in entrepreneurship fairs.
- Mentor-ship and follow up of trainees with creative and innovative ideas.
- Two students’ product launch awaiting NAFDAC certification
- Started with 8 staff and now 70 staff in the Directorate.
For further information, please contact:
Prof. Inegbedion Juliet O.
Director, Directorate for Entrepreneurship and General Studies
+234 9021866984