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The purpose of this study was to determine the extent to which students' industrial work experience scheme (SIWES) students in higher education institutions experienced a high level of engagement in workplace activities and a strong sense of affiliation with their workplace environment. The additional purpose encompassed the identification of factors that both facilitated and hindered their engagement and self-efficacy.

The data for this study were collected via a cross-sectional survey of 243 students who were undertaking the SIWES as a mandatory component of their graduation requirements. The survey was conducted at selected tertiary institutions in Nigeria.

The qualitative replies yielded valuable insights on the factors that motivated and supported participation, with self-efficacy emerging as a significant facilitator as well as a potential barrier. There is a positive association between more interactions, a professional atmosphere and self-efficacy.

The study may not comprehensively include all contextual variables that might potentially impact students' perception of belongingness and self-efficacy during the SIWES program, including the distinct industry or workplace setting.

This exploratory study analyzes SIWES students' cultural and personal affiliation. The study suggests these changes improve student performance. Engagement and belonging techniques for students, supervisors, coworkers and professionals are classified by the study. The study found that supervisors and coworkers help students at work. It underlines academics' responsibility in creating SIWES curricula that increase student confidence and active learning. According to this study, students should receive self-confidence therapy before SIWES. Self-confidence and student success and well-being need additional investigation, the report says.

This study takes a unique approach by examining belongingness and self-efficacy in the SIWES course. It examines the interdependence of these notions and the curriculum's various challenges and opportunities. By addressing these important issues, study adds to existing knowledge and lays the groundwork for future research.

As the 4th industrial revolution (4IR) unfolds, there is an increasing awareness that its implications for workforce transformation and shifts in workforce demand will profoundly impact the future of work. Specifically, the paper seeks to answer the following research questions: i) how does Students’ Industrial Work Experience Scheme (SIWES) equip young people for the real world of work, especially in the era of the third industrial revolution?; ii) does SIWES support the exposure of young people to the world of digitalization?; and iii) what are the effects of the SIWES exposure on the employability of young people? This paper aims to evaluate the University Internship system and preparation of young people for the world of work in the 4th industrial revolution.

This paper used a mixed method to unravel the objectives of this study, that is, quantitative and qualitative methods. For the former, structured questionnaires were used to elicit a response from 249 young people drawn from tertiary institutions across Lagos State, Nigeria. The latter used an in-depth interview method conducted among 45 respondents (25 employers of labor and 20 lecturers).

The findings reveal that: SIWES contributes meaningfully to the advancement of knowledge and capacity building among young people; SIWES exposes young people to the world of digitalization, depending on the organization where the internship takes place; and SIWES pays little attention to financial rewards and more attention to the acquisition of skills that are relevant to the world of work. The practical and policy implications of the findings are critically discussed.

This paper critically evaluates the SIWES policy amidst the growing threats of widening skills gap, greater inequality and broader polarization.

The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the relevance of students industrial work experience scheme (SIWES) to real estate education in Nigeria.

Primary data were collected with the aid of questionnaire served on 182 parts 3 and 4 students of Estate Management and Valuation, Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile Ife, Nigeria. The descriptive methods of mean and proportion method were used to determine the factors that are considered could contribute to real estate education in Nigeria.

The result shows that SIWES is an integral part of real estate education and that it helps the students to acquire behavioural skills in addition to acquiring necessary experience required to set up private practice upon completion.

Obtaining the perception of students alone could make the findings one sided and bias. Further detailed research targeted at the employers of labour will provide a balanced view. Also, extending further studies to incorporating students of more universities will be more exciting.

This paper is an effort at stimulating the interest of other researchers in conducting similar research to cover all institutions in Nigeria as well as obtaining the perception of the employers of labour in this respect.

This study explores how career training with mentoring (CTM) programs work in Nigerian higher education (HE) institutions to foster students' career development and employability of graduates. It also explores how Nigerian HE curriculum can be adequately used to facilitate CTM as well as possible constraints to effective implementation of CTM programs in Nigerian HE institutions.

The study draws on interviews with well-qualified and experienced experts from six Nigerian public universities (each from the 6 geo-political zones of Nigeria), and 20 industries also within the same 6 geo-political zones of Nigeria that were selected for this study using a purposeful sampling technique. The study interviewed 33 experts comprising 21 senior academics at Nigerian universities and 12 industry executives to reveal substantial information about CTM programs in Nigerian HE institutions.

Drawing on the three key themes that emerged during the thematic analysis and linked to social cognitive career theory, it is clear that participants are convinced that CTM can enhance clarity about students' career ambitions, career interests, personal development plans and employability. Findings show that there are some career-related programs or activities that Nigerian HE students are presented with, but the programs have not been effective as to offer graduates quality career guidance and employability skills that employers demand. Acknowledging these, participants recommend establishing CTM centres in all Nigerian HE institutions to provide students with the opportunity to receive quality career advice, coaching and mentoring services while schooling.

The findings of this study shed light on varying resources required to cope with the demands of labour market in terms of supply of competent workforce that can contribute to Nigeria's economic growth and development. The findings are highly relevant for Nigeria and other developing countries' policy and research initiatives that aim to promote social inclusion and equity and improve better working conditions for all. The findings also have implications for career development and employability of HE graduates in developing world context.

Understanding the role that CTM programs can play in facilitating career development and graduate employability can arguably be of importance within the developing world context. This study, therefore, provides significant suggestions on how to build sustained HEIs and labour market partnership to foster career development and employability of HE graduates through establishing CTM centres in every Nigerian HE institutions.

Following the outcry of several employers that many higher education (HE) graduates do not possess employability skills and therefore are not employable, the purpose of this paper, therefore, is to examine what the labour market (LM) actually demands from the higher education institutions (HEIs) and how the demands of the LM can be met by the HEIs in Nigeria.

The study is based on interviews and focus group with 28 university professors, executives of the students’ industrial work scheme (SIWES), industry executives, executive officers of the Directorate of Employment and the HE course/programme leaders that revealed substantial information about what the LM actually requires from the HE, and how the HE can meet the demands of the LM in terms of supply of quality graduates.

The key findings reveal that with adequate teaching resources and competent teachers, graduate employability skills (technical and soft), which the LM demands from the HEIs, can be imparted to the students. Concerning LM and HEIs partnerships, it is found that understanding the demands of the LM by the HEIs can enhance the graduates’ outcomes and their prospects in the LM.

The study argues that the graduate employability is still relevant to the existing practice, but further engagement and research surrounding how the HEIs in the developing countries, especially Nigeria, can meet the actual demands of the LM in terms of competent graduates are needed to examine this range of HE.

The study provides significant suggestions on the improvement needs of the HE teachers to inspire and motivate students to increase the knowledge (know-how), skills (how to do), self-efficacy (effectiveness) and qualities (technical and creative knowledge) required by the LM.

Following the tenets of experiential learning theory (ELT) and social cognitive theory (SCT), this study aims to investigate the influence of higher technology education students' placement experiences (work-related learning by teaching practice [WLTP] and by industry attachment [WLIA]) on learning self-efficacy (LSE) and perceived employability skills (PES) (namely, perceived future network [PFN], perceived expected experiences [PEE]), perceived future personal characteristics (PFPC), perceived future labour market knowledge (PFLMK) and perceived future skills (PFS).

Using two-wave surveys (T1 & T2), data were collected from technical education students (N = 257) in Nigerian universities. At T1, LSE and PES were measured, while WLTP, WLIA, LSE and PES were measured at T2. The repeated measure t-test, and structural equation modelling were applied for statistical analyses.

The authors found a significant increase in the students' LSE and PES from T1 to T2. Direct associations between WLTP, WLIA, LSE and PES were partly supported. Similarly, WLTP and WLIA have indirect relationships with PES via LSE. However, the result of the indirect effect is partly supported for WLTP and PES relations; but fully supported for WLIA and PES relations.

Although this study is not an experimental design to absolutely justify causality, it has provided valuable empirical evidence that added to the extant literature on higher education students' work-related learning, learning ability and employability skills.

To the authors' knowledge, this is the first study to explore the simultaneous influence of two aspects of students' work placement (WLTP and WLAI) on LSE and employability as well as the changes that occur after the placement.

Graduate unemployment in agriculture is a serious challenge in Nigeria. Literatures suggest two arguments explaining this. First, the skills possessed by graduates are mostly incompatible with the needs of industries; second, universities produce more graduates than required. Focussing on universities as the source of change to address these two arguments, the purpose of the study was to examine the case of Ekiti State University agricultural faculty. The study investigated students' perspectives regarding their motivations for choosing agriculture over other disciplines, training received in critical thinking, innovation and soft-skills and their courage and willingness to undertake self-employment upon graduation.

The study adopted a qualitative research design to collect and analyse data from a case study. Data were collected through semi-structured individual interviews with 42 respondents from amongst the Ekiti State University final year B. Agric agricultural students that totalled 108. Seven of the respondents were purposively selected following recommendations from their lecturers due to their bright academic performances. Others were chosen using convenience sampling.

The study found that students preferred other science disciplines to agriculture and only ended up studying agriculture out of frustration of not gaining admission into their preferred fields. Students generally denied ever undertaking any training in critical and soft skills either as courses on their own or through the teaching methods adopted in other courses. Respondents generally expressed willingness to undertake self-employment but expressed lack of confidence to do so solely based on their little practical exposure and lack of access to basic resources like finance and land.

Only agricultural students of Ekiti State University were sampled; hence, the results is not generalisable to other disciplines in the university or to all Universities in Nigeria. Convenience sampling was used because access to all members of the sampled population at the same time was not possible due to different timetables for lectures for the various disciplines and non-readiness of some students to be interviewed for lack of interest or for commitment to other engagements.

The study practically implied that the theoretical training offered to agricultural students of Ekiti State University needs to be balanced with practical exposure, such that students gain enough confidence to practice what they have learnt upon graduation to earn a living.

The study revealed that there is need for curriculum review for agricultural studies at Ekiti State University in a way that will accommodate relevant practical trainings for students to make them suitable for either hired employment or self-employment upon graduation.

The author hereby declares that this manuscript is the author's own work and it contains, to the best of the author's knowledge, no materials previously published or written by another person. The author has no idea of an in-depth study of this nature that has been done to analyse the gap between the training received by agricultural students in Universities and the skills required to make them capable for hired employment or self-employment upon graduation from universities.

University-industry collaboration (UIC) is a symbiosis relationship, brought about through knowledge and resource sharing, with the attendant benefits of innovation and technological advancement. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the state of UIC in quantity surveying profession in Nigeria with a view to ascertaining the situation and chatting the way forward.

Using quantitative survey research approach, primary data were collected through the administration of structured questionnaires on quantity surveying academia and practitioners. A total of 126 respondents were sampled: 52 university lecturers and 74 quantity surveying firms. Of these, 32 university lecturers (61.54%) and 34 quantity surveying firms (45.95%) provided valid responses. In all, this amounts to 52.38% response rate. The quantitative data obtained were analysed using mean score, frequency distribution, percentage and Mann Whitney test.

The findings show that collaboration is very strong in the areas of student industrial placement and research cooperation between students and academic researchers. However, collaboration in the areas of funding and staff exchange was found to be lagging behind.

The findings indicate strong collaboration areas (student industrial placement and research cooperation) to be sustained as well as weak areas (funding and staff exchange) to be critically looked into.

The paper represents the first research to empirically assess the state of UIC in quantity surveying profession in Nigeria. In addition, it shows the areas where efforts should be concentrated in maximizing the benefit of UIC.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the factors affecting academic performance of real estate students in a developing country like Nigeria.

Data for the study were collected with the aid of questionnaire served on 152 final year real estate students of Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife and Federal University of Technology Akure, in southwestern Nigeria. Data collected were analysed using descriptive and inferential statistics.

Findings show that the factors relating to academic assessment, parent/family background and teaching methods or techniques have more impact on students’ academic performance, while school and general academic environment had less influence on students’ academic performance.

The study complements the body of knowledge regarding the factors influencing real estate students’ academic performance from the point of view of an emerging economy where issues of socioeconomic, academic and training perspectives differ from what obtains in advanced economies.

This study is one of the few attempts at establishing factors that influence real estate students’ performance, especially from an emerging economy like Nigeria.

This study aims to examine a comparative analysis of electronic- and paper-based data collection methods.

Survey research approach was adopted to conduct the study. A total of 500 library and information science (LIS) researcher/information professionals selected randomly from seven states in Nigeria represent the sample for the study. A self-designed questionnaire was used to gather data from the respondents. Six objectives were developed to guide the study.

The findings reveal that there is preference for paper-based than the electronic-based data collection methods, and similarly, respondents indicated they cannot use any other data collection methods other than paper-based. Electronic data collection method is beneficial in terms of gathering a representative sample within a short period compared to the paper-based method. The researcher has control over access to the survey in the paper-based method compared to the electronic method, and there is opportunity to monitor the progress of the research and clarify ambiguity by the researcher. The electronic method is limited in terms of collecting data from only the respondents who are computer-literate with good Web skills, while the paper-based method is limited by higher attrition rate, money and time consumption.

The study did not consider the time needed to gather data with each method or the amount of time needed for data entry, cleaning and coding. It is possible that a time-motion study would reveal clear superiority of either one method or the other. The total sample of participants in the study is also limited, considering the total number of LIS researcher/information professionals in Nigeria.

The study has underlined the value of electronic/Web-based collection as a cost- and time-saving instrument in modern LIS research. Regardless of method and trial, electronic data collection could fulfill in all examined parameters, its promises, realizing cost savings of up to a 50 per cent in comparison with the paper-based data collection method.

The paper is solely the idea of the author.