BAC Caps More Graduates
Tumelo Mouwane | Monday December 7, 2015 16:39
Eleven students graduated with first class degrees compared to last year’s five. The School of Business and Leisure had the highest number of Bachelor of Arts and Masters Degree graduates.
Speaking to The Monitor on the sidelines of the event, BAC’s executive director Michael Lesolle said 600 of the graduates were coming from corporate learning and leadership programs, and the rest acquired undergraduate and post-graduate degrees.
They were graduating with international certified programmes from universities of Sunderland and Derby, Lesolle said.
Lesole stated that they are planning to add more programs to the already available courses next year.
“A lot of what we put into our programs is really dictated upon by the market and industry needs. Relevant programs such as Public Sector Financial Management are the type of financial programs we want to be doing next year. This year we introduced a program in Banking and Finance degree. “We are also planning to introduce an executive MBA, which will be of interest to more than just qualified accountants. At the moment only qualified accountants can get into the MBA we have right now. As a result, we are widening that part for an executive MBA that will appeal to more than just qualified accountants,” He said.
Lesole said that almost all BAC tourism students are absorbed in the market.
“We see a lot of hotels around the country absorbing our students and even wanting to employ them when they are still studying,” he said.
He further said they prepare their students for industry by mentoring them to pursue their own businesses.
“It will be not be everybody who gets into the job market. So we mentor and teach our students that much as is not easy to do so, one doesn’t have to work for somebody, because the skills and knowledge they acquire from the institution are enough to get them to pursue their own businesses,” Lesolle said.
Despite an increase in number of graduates this year, Lesolle said BAC experienced a drop in number of Botswana General Certificate of Secondary Education (BCSE) levers admittance due to sponsorship challenges last year
Commenting on the recent ministry of education’s target 20 000 Upskilling and upscaling program, Lesolle said there were no consultation at the initial stage and they could have provided more programs for the target 20 000 program.
“We would have offered a lot more programs but it is not just us. We had a number of additional programs that we could have put into the program and we did make that submission to the sponsor. “The program could have been done better if we could have set around the table to give them an understanding what we can offer. There has never been consultation at initial stages in relation to the target 20 000 program,” He said.
BAC, which will be turning 20 next year, had an intake of only 800 just a decade ago, but now the school has in excess of 5000 students.