It was a picture of joy as they held the loaves aloft. The administrators, students and baking crew looked happy to launch their bakery and their bread.

It was a giant leap for students of Federal Polytechnic, Offa, Kwara State, who established the bakery, where some of them have been busy turning flour into a popular breakfast offering. The product may not be attractively branded or packaged but there was no doubt at its launch that the students have given everyone, including their counterparts elsewhere, something to chew on.

One of its highlights is the fact that students set up the bakery, a veritable money spinner. Another point is that students are part of the baking trade, learning crucial skills in an academic setting where such a thing never happened before. That was why Acting Rector of the institution Dr Ayodele Olaosebikan and the students union President (SUG) Yusuf Olalekan made a case for vocational education.

The duo said this at the mini-campus of the institution in Offa, Offa Local Government Area of the state at the commissioning of bakery. Dr Olaosebikan added that the technical/vocational education would ensure attainment of sustainable development goals (SDGS) in the country.

She said that the effort of the students was in line with the 'change' agenda of the President Muhammadu Buhari-led administration to reduce unemployment and poverty in Nigeria. She said, "I want to appreciate the president’s change initiative which has become a great drive for technical and vocational education in Nigeria; at the Federal Polytechnic Offa, we are imbued by this drive to produce graduates with skills and self-reliance.

"It would interest you to know that soonest technology will be adopted to conduct examinations for students through computer based examinations (CBE). This effort is to eradicate lots of bottlenecks like loss of scripts and delayed processing of results. "I therefore enjoin all students to improve their computer proficiency so as to avoid difficulties when the programme begins.

"I want to call on the polytechnic's alumni association and corporate organisations to join hands with the management especially on research funding, physical development and endowment of prizes in order to encourage the students. The present management will continue to support innovation, research and evolve policies in line with the change mantra of the federal government that will create and maintain the enabling environment for enhanced private sector investment in the polytechnic."

Olalekan urged the federal and Kwara state governments to partner with the polytechnic in promoting entrepreneurship, adding that polytechnic is the bedrock of economic and technological growth of any nation. He said, "We intend to equip and prepare our fellow students on entrepreneurship skills and we also have in mind to establish sachet and table water factory for the school."