Rwanda’s prosperity lies with its human capital

Rwanda has experienced a lot of progress in the recent times in various sectors of the economy. The roads are well built and electricity is easily accessible to the majority of the population. The government has also ensured that it has put security of its people as its first priority. Doing business has been made easy and so many companies are putting up tents in Kigali, a clear indication that it is emerging as the business hub of East Africa.The Education sector has also seen tremendous improvement and this can been observed by the governments’ efforts to facilitate teacher mentorship programs to ensure that teachers get well equipped with the best teaching methods especially with the use of English as medium of instruction. This investment has been done with the foresight of having an expanded economy that has well educated citizens that can smoothly run organizations and various projects within the country.The Japanese have a saying that, “The mind is not an empty vessel to be filled but a fire to be ignited,” which clearly illustrates that we need to train our students well so that they can actively use their mental abilities to participate actively in the production of quality service to the nation. As my good friend says, “Finance is the engine of a business and human resource is the driver,’’ there is need to appreciate the role played by the people in fostering progress of the nation. A well educated populace will enable job creation to take place and hence increased consumption power of the people. This will enable goods and services be exchanged freely and other factors of production to be employed.It is very encouraging when you see various scholarships been offered by the government and other educational institutions in order to promote learning. Every student should know that the resources allocated to them need to have a high rate of return so that when they pay back the loans granted to them, other students can get an opportunity of using them. It is such an opportunity that enables needy students to say goodbye to poverty and the spillover effects will be witnessed in their future generations where people will have intrinsic as well as extrinsic motivation to learn since they will see it as one way to achieve success.Everyone has recognized the role of education to changing fortunes of a country and that is why we find universities coming up with various degree programs to suit the current needs and gaps in the job market. A course like social media management has come to existence because of its vital role in changing ways of doing business and simplifying communication. Mature students have also not been left out in the pursuit of knowledge since many of them have enrolled in evening classes to advance their studies and be competitive in the job market.Technical education has also been given a priority since not everyone can end in white collar jobs and for a country to prosper it has to have a well balanced human resource. This is why we have Workforce development authority (WDA) which has the mandate to test students technical knowledge in the subjects taught. In service trainings should also be implemented by all organizations in the country so that their employees can be updated with the relevant skills that will make them produce high quality products and give them a competitive advantage over their competitors. It will also be important to note that with good education, Rwanda will have the opportunity of exporting its human resource and earn foreign exchange as well as foreign direct investments from its citizens working abroad and this will highly boost its economy.The writer is a teacher at Riviera High School