The federal government through the National Board for Technical Education (NBTE) has announced the unbundling of the Higher National Diploma (HND) Computer Science in all polytechnics, monotechnics and technical institutions across Nigeria.
This directive is contained in a letter duly signed by Idris Bugaje, executive secretary of the National Board for Technical Education, and addressed to the director general of the National Youths Service Corp (NYSC) while the director general of the Industrial Training Fund (ITF) and all rectors, provosts and head of polytechnics, monotechnics, and all similar technical institutions were copied.
According to the letter, “Due to emerging trends and the need to strategically position our graduates for more effective national development, I wish to notify you that the board has unbundled the HND Computer Science programme run in all institutions under our purview.
The new specialized areas floated out of the former are as follows: HND Artificial Intelligence, HND Networking and Cloud Computing, HND Software and Web Development and HND Cybersecurity and Data Protection.
Consequently, there will no longer be admission into the HND Computer Science programme from the 2024/2025 academic session. Students that have been already admitted into the former programme are given up to 2025 to phase out.”
The board explained further that this is to encourage diversification into the world of Computer Science and allow the country’s graduates to access the wide space of the field.
With this development, no HND awarding institutions will be allowed to admit a new set of students to study Computer Science from the 2024/2025 academic session as the board projects to ease out the study of HND Computer Science by 2025.
Students who desire to study computer science at the HND level are counselled to now choose from any of the four specialised areas floated from the former “Computer Science” discipline.
