Metilelu- No students should have to drop out.
The Chief Executive Officer of PressPayNg, an EdTech firm, Mr Abiola Metilelu, has said no student should have to drop out due to lack of funds.
During his interview with Dailysun on Tuesday 4th January 2022 where he was invited to speak more about the novel innovation. In his words: “18% of Nigerian students in tertiary institutions lack funds and drop out of school for financial reasons, thereby truncating their dreams of acquiring higher education and that can be a big challenge most of the times.”
He, therefore, said in order to stem the tide of increasing dropout of students from tertiary institutions in Nigeria, the country must think of creative ways of funding education and making it accessible to Nigerian youths. This is necessary as the country is already contending with about 13.5 million children that are out of school at primary and secondary school levels.
Speaking with The Education Report Mr Abiola spoke about how the novel solution will empower students to commence tertiary education and complete it at the right time. According to him “Human capital development needs quality education to unlock the potentials of a country. Today’s world is knowledge-based and we need creative efforts and thinking to fund education. National ambitions cannot be realised without solid, quality education.
“Tertiary education should be accessible, qualitative and we must stem the tide of the backsliding in tertiary education. Students are dropping out for lack of funds and finance. We are championing technological convergence at funding tertiary education.
“We cannot rely only on inadequate funding from government. We need more donations and philanthropic gestures and by so doing we have partnered with financial institutions, insurance companies, HMO srevice providers and players in human capital sectors. We must build a Nigeria where education is affordable and where dreams are realised,” he said.
Metilelu listed some of the services provided by the company to include Edusavings, EduLoans, Edusure, EduHealth, scholarships and holiday job among others.
The Chief Launcher, Mr Fashola Shamsudeen, said there had been a number of people and organisations who wanted to help indigent students but could not find credible platforms to do so, but with PressPayNg
that gap will be filled.
The National President of the National Association of Nigerian Students, Comrade Sunday Ashefon, said the association met with the management of the firm following the letter that was sent to NANS in regard of what PressPayNg is into and after going through their proposal, we were sure they would help Nigerian students in a lot of ways,” therefore we were ready to partner with the organisation as it was convinced of its genuine intentions and what it has to offer.
