From Home Economics to entrepreneurship

With the drive for entrepreneurship, some schools have incorporated skills impacting subjects in their curriculum. ELIZABETH USEN and VICTORY USIOBOH were at Dabitos Schools, Ilasa-Maja, Lagos, to see how pupils translate home economic skills into a business.

For Eniola Adedigba, a Senior Secondary School (SSS) I, looks forward to being an artist in future. His arts and crafts class remains an interesting and educating medium for him to understand the terrain he is going into and also to hone his skills.

According to him, attending arts and crafts classes has enabled him to draw and sketch better, be more creative in his painting and to carry out other crafts.

Akinwumi Adetayo and Oluyemi Esther also in SSS I, noted that arts and crafts will put food on the table at any time of the day. According to the students, with their knowledge of knitting, they could design different household items such as tablecloths, doormats, beddings and napkins, aside from drawing beautiful pictures on canvass for people to buy.

“Apart from this, we can draw life pictures of people at parties or any gathering and get paid for them. Having a skill, in addition to a formal education puts one ahead of his/her peers in the labour market, as such a person could end up being an employer of labour; engaging even some of his/her mates,” Adetayo said.

Esther, who has begun to put her skill into practice revealed that she sometimes get paid for making fashionable bags for friends, relatives and neighbours. She said: “I need to keep on practising what I learnt at school so that I can improve on my skill. While doing this, I see people that like and would want to buy some of my works and I do welcome them; so, I sell them to make money.”

Sarako Elizabeth, whose interest is cooking said she prefers acquiring culinary skills. She revealed that because of her interest, she prefers to attend home economics classes. She revealed: “Home economics is not all about cooking; we also learn how to take good care of our homes. The class also encourages boys to take part in home chores — cook, stitch and do interior decor.”

Explaining how culinary skills could make her fend for herself and even employ others in future, Sarako said, “ I now apply the cooking and sewing skills I learnt in school at home while helping my mother in the kitchen and also taking care of the home in her absence. And if in future, I do not have a job, I could rely on them to fend for myself and even engage hands to assist me. Also, each time any cloth is torn or the buttons are detached in the house, I help to amend them.”

In agreement with Sarako’s views, Fowale Moyosola revealed that home economics has aroused her interest in catering and event management, adding that the skills she has acquired so far could make her cook for people at events and earn huge sums of money.

Commending his teachers for their efforts, Solid-Rest Eni disclosed that home economics has made him to begin to think of taking up fashion designing as a career, stressing that the subject has taught him how to sketch patterns, cut and sew them to taste.

For Okpai Chinaso, since man has limited resources to satisfy his wants and needs, it then means he has to acquire skills that would enable him fix some items around him when they go bad. He noted that with the knowledge of stitching he has acquired from home economics classes, he can effectively amend his own clothes without going to any tailor to do that for him.