The leading airline distribution solution provider in aviation industry, Sabre Network West Africa, Alpha First Travel and Tourism Academy and Babcock University, Ilisan Remo have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to commence Master’s Degree in Business Administration (MBA), programme in aviation studies.
The programme is to run between 12 and 18 months period and with that agreement, Babcock has become the first university in Nigeria to offer such a course in aviation.
The President, Sabre Network West Africa, Mr. Gbenga Olowo said that the programme in aviation studies was opened to all first degree graduates in any discipline anywhere in the world.
He assured that the programme would help to provide manpower for the nation’s aviation industry and explained that the company chose Babcock because of its integrity and willingness to work with the organisation.
Olowo however, lamented that graduates are regularly rolled out of higher institutions of learning across the country, but most of them were not employable as they have to be retrained before they could fit into the system, but expressed the hope that with the partnership with Babcock, Nigerian graduates who intend to work in the country’s aviation industry would improve their knowledge of the industry.
Olowo noted that the first set of students would resume in September this year when the school is expected to resume for another academic session.
“We are bothered that graduates are being rolled out regularly and they come to us for jobs, but they are not employable because they don’t have what it takes to be engaged by organisations. By the time we give this foundation here, the training that would be given to young graduates would reduce.
“The signing of MoU between Sabre Network, Alpha First and Babcock is for MBA programme in Airline Studies. The next thing is registration of intending students and it will be on the website of the school. The session starts in September this year. It is for between 12 and 18 months programme and basically for weekends.
We are expecting as many as many people. In fact, we are thinking of 180 million Nigerians. Luckily, there is no university in Nigeria or on the continent that runs this programme. So, we are pioneering his programme. International Air Transport Association (IATA) and Maevis are conceptualising their own now and we are ahead of them,” Olowo said.
