STUDEnT EnGAGEMEnT AnD PARTnERInG FOR EMPLOYABILITY SKILLS DEVELOPMEnT

This study is motivated by the current high rate of graduates’ unemployment in Nigeria, occasioned by poor exposure of students to practical entrepreneurial skills development. The objective is to develop a tripartite partnering (public institutions, private institution and the students) model for employability skills development in Nigerian universities. The paper employed survey method for data collection and non-parametric statistics for exploration of entrepreneurial perception of 480 students’ drawn from eight universities in the South East and South regions of Nigeria. The result shows that students that engaged in practical and collaborative entrepreneurial extra curricula activities have had opportunities to be mentored by experienced entrepreneurial minded academic and business leaders. The out-of-classroom experiences equipped them with critical personality traits and business management skills favourable to entrepreneurial venturing upon graduation. Unfortunately, this is not the case for students who are not involved in such extra curricula entrepreneurial activities.

progress revolves (Ebiringa, 2012).Tertiary education is targeted at equipping its beneficiaries with practical skills and experiences needed to bring about positive changes in the society.Tertiary institutions with quality entrepreneurial curricula content have taken the lead in global ranking due largely to their ability to attract entrepreneurial minded faculties and students as well as seasoned professionals from industry as mentors.Their shared vision of global best higher education which emphasis employability skills development has link most of them into global networks of entrepreneurial clubs such as Enactus (entrepreneurship-act-on-us) formally SIFE (Students in Free Enterprise) for the sole purpose of developing multi-skilled, multitalented future global entrepreneurial minded business leaders, under the supervision, guidance and mentorship of current academic and business leaders.
Existence of students entrepreneurship clubs in tertiary institutions remain strategic option for addressing the problem of graduate unemployment especially in developing countries such as Nigeria, as it provides opportunities to students in tertiary institutions engage in entrepreneurial activities that equip the requisite skills to jump-start the process of effecting desired changes in globalized business environment through the positive power of business (Barcelona & Valida, 1994) either as entrepreneurs or intrepreneurs.Through student entrepreneurial clubs young men and women in tertiary institutions are inspired to take out-of-classroom entrepreneurial actions aimed at finding solutions to economic, social and environmental problems (such as unemployment, low standard of living and poverty) affecting their communities, in partnership with academic and business leaders.
Small entrepreneurial actions taken by student entrepreneurial clubs in various communities of the world have cumulate into highly impactful, transformational and sustainable developmental initiatives that have brought about positive changes in our world today (the Facebook, Tweeter are example).Their passion to bring about positive change has remained key motivating factor, while resourcefulness and dexterity are critical drivers for the youths.
Student Entrepreneurial Clubs have provided platforms for involving and engaging undergraduates in skilled and ethical moulding of future business leaders of our time.In fact it affords undergraduates opportunity to take charge of the evolution of their future as their inactive involvement in the past has led to unpleasant consequences (graduate unemployment, insecurity, income inequality and poverty) especially in most underdeveloped countries including Nigeria, where the locust "corruption" has eaten up proceeds of God given resources (foreign revenue from crude oil export) leading to emergence corrupt super-citizens who apparently seems economically and politically stronger than the State.The above arguments motivates this investigation, whose objective is to promote a student-led tripartite public -private partnership engagement towards providing economically viable, socially and environmentally sustainable framework addressing the problem of lack of employability skills among graduates of Nigerian universities.This paper seek to compare the entrepreneurial dispositions of undergraduate students who belong to entrepreneurial clubs with those of their counterparts who do not belong to any.The objective being among others to assess and benchmark the two categories of undergraduates on critical psychological characteristics associated with entrepreneurship as existing in the literature.We expect that the findings made will go a long way in promoting and encouraging the establishment of students' entrepreneurship clubs in tertiary institutions in Nigeria as a way of enhancing the quality of entrepreneurial education with the objective of solving the problem of graduate youth unemployment in line with the views of Eckhardt & Shane (2003).

THEORETICAL BACKGROUnD
Much of the research in entrepreneurship has been founded upon the premise that entrepreneurs embody distinctive personality which can be identified and used to indicate potential for entrepreneurship (Barcelona & Valida, 1994).Given the increasing importance of entrepreneurship in the world economic order, there is practical value in being able to distinguish students who have distinctive entrepreneurial potential and those who do not.With knowledge of these factors associated with entrepreneurial potential, programs such as entrepreneurship clubs can be initiated by the educational institutions, to develop and enhance these factors in order to encourage student entrepreneurship.This study is more significant as Nigerian graduates in the most recent time have often been described as not possessing employability skills by employers of labour, hence the very high incidence of graduate youth unemployment in Nigeria (Global Entrepreneurship Monitor, 2012).
In response to the above problem, government education authorities like National Universities Commission (NUC) and National Board for Technical Education (NBTE) have introduced compulsory entrepreneurial courses in curricula of programmes.Also specialized courses have become increasingly common in tertiary institutions but the extent to which all these has been promoted and encouraged sustainable entrepreneurial behaviour among students remain issues that deserve investigations.
It is believed that the ideal stage to acquire basic knowledge about entrepreneurship and to foster a positive attitude towards entrepreneurship is during adolescent years (Ebiringa, 2011a).
Researchers have advocated that entrepreneurial potential should be identified, evaluated and nurtured at the undergraduate level, when the possibility of self-employment as a career option is still open.
Enactus (Entrepreneurship act-on-us) formerly known as Students in Free Enterprise (SIFE) is an international, nonprofit students' entrepreneurial organization founded in 1975 and has its headquarters in Springfield, Missouri, USA, with presence in over 40 countries and more than 1,500 tertiary institutions worldwide.Enactus is a partnership between business organizations and tertiary institutions that is preparing the next generation of entrepreneurs and business leaders towards creating a better world for everyone.Enactus is a unique students' entrepreneurial organization that strategically links students, academic institutions, and businesses.Enactus encourages the personal and professional development of new business leaders, the creation and exchange of new research and business practices, the enhanced and creative learning opportunities for its project audiences, and a high level of communication between all parties.Their vision is to help students achieve their dreams through practical entrepreneurial education and providing students the best opportunity to make a difference in their communities and beyond (see www.enactus.org).
The goal of Enactus is to inspire young minds in tertiary institutions to make a difference in their communities by developing and implementing outreach entrepreneurial projects that seeks to improve the quality of life and standard of living for the community members.Their efforts help aspiring entrepreneurs, struggling business owners, low income families, women and youths experience success.Enactus students Organization at global, national and local levels are funded by generous global, national and local sponsors.In addition to financial support and in-kind donations, these sponsors contribute their time and expertise as well in mentoring the students.
Through Enactus, students experience profound personal growth.As they assume leadership roles of significance and influence.Enactus prepares university students towards being leaders of sustainable environmentally and socially responsible enterprises as well as building stronger communities and creating a world with greater and better opportunities for everyone.
Considerable agreement exists among researchers as well as development partners regarding the importance of entrepreneurship education as stimulant of sustainable economic development.There has been unprecedented demand for entrepreneurial education that provides skills, and positive attitudinal change needed to succeed in an increasingly divergent and highly competitive globalized world.Many countries regard "entrepreneurship" as the solution for economic depression (Acs & Szerb, 2007).Entrepreneurship has been recognized and accepted by economies the world over as the catalyst to boost innovation and growth for an economy (Chen et al., 2012).Nowadays, entrepreneurship has become the key word that attaches great attention by governments and workers (Huang et al., 2010).In other words, the need for positive changes in unemployed population, national productivity and household incomes significantly and positively influence paradigm shift towards entrepreneurship (Jennings & McDonald, 2007).Psychologists suggest that human beings' behavior is influenced by attitude the most.Attitude is the base of a person's view and explanation toward external things.It is the behavior in advance with emotional intention of direct purposes.Thus, it is necessary to recognize attitude in order to probe into reaction.Many psychologists also suggest that a person's behavior can be predicted by recognizing his (her) attitude (Promundo, 2010).As young people (students) have the potential to contribute much to society, researchers have tried to analyse student entrepreneurs' personalities, skills, and attitudes as well as the conditions that foster student entrepreneurship.The Psychological Characteristics School of Entrepreneurship, which focuses on personality factors, believes that student entrepreneurship clubs afford their members the opportunity to acquire unique skills, attitudes and values for a successful academic life while in school and a happy out of school life (McMullan et al., 2002).
Student entrepreneurs can be differentiated from non-entrepreneurial one by personality characteristics.Students who possess the same characteristics as entrepreneurs have higher tendency (or potential) to take entrepreneurial actions than those who do not possess such characteristics.The main psychological characteristics associated with entrepreneurship in the literature such as need for achievement, need for affiliation, locus of control, risk-taking propensity and tolerance of ambiguity are equally relevant in the making of student entrepreneurs.
Entrepreneurship education is an integrated process that provide youths with the concepts, skills and exposures to recognize opportunities in their environments that others have overlooked and to have the insight, self-esteem, and knowledge to act where others have hesitated.Students entrepreneurship clubs aims to be a source of trigger-events aiming to inspire students, arouse emotions, and change mindsets (Henry & Hill, 2005).Practical entrepreneurship education pedagogical design can be differentiated into three basic activities: • the creation and maintenance of an entrepreneurial culture at the university as a whole; • degree granting programs and majors; and • specific non credit training such as involvement in out-of-classroom experiences such the activities of a Students Entrepreneurship Clubs like Enactus.
A balanced entrepreneurship program (De Mel et al., 2012) should contain four key components: • lectures on business concepts • business-planning practices including competitions and coaching; • interaction with practitioners and networking opportunities and • University support such as marketresearch resources, meeting space, seed funding, patenting advice, etc.
Numerous studies have been conducted on isolating entrepreneurial characteristics using students as test sample (Karlan & Valdivia, 2011)  establish the variations that exist in students with regards to possession of these entrepreneurial personality characteristics.
Researchers have studied the characteristics associated with entrepreneurship in order to find out the differences between student entrepreneurs and non-entrepreneurs.Research has strongly supported psychological attributes, not perception and awareness, as the theoretical cornerstone for predicting entrepreneurial behavior and potential (ILO, 2012).
A number of psychological attributes have been suggested as predictors of entrepreneurial behavior, with some degree of concurrence.Lumpkin and Erdogan (2004) looked at the needs of achievement, affiliation and power in entrepreneurs versus others.Kantor (1988) is of the view that propensity towards entrepreneurship is associated with several personal characteristics such as values and attitudes, personal goals, creativity, risk-taking propensity and locus of control.Of the personality traits, Ebiringa (2011b) proposed achievement motivation, risk taking and locus of control as important characteristics.Among these characteristics, risk assessment and risk taking are considered the primary elements of entrepreneurship.
Need for achievement, tolerance for ambiguity, risk taking and locus of control were analyzed with respect to entrepreneurial characteristics and were identified as correlates of being or desiring to be an entrepreneur (Olson, 2004).
However, Scale of Big Five personality traits are treated as the most stable scale to measure personality trait."Agreeableness", "openness to experience", "extraversion" and "conscientiousness" of Big Five personality traits significantly and positively influences entrepreneurship; "neuroticism" significantly and negatively influences entrepreneurship (Pushkar & Subha, 2012).Based on literatures this paper sought to validate the hypothesis "the preponderance to entrepreneurship by students that belong to students' entrepreneurship clubs is not significantly higher than that of those who are non-members of such club".

METHODOLOGY
This paper focused universities in the five (5) universities in the South East and three (3) universities in the South-South regions of Nigeria having local chapters of "Enactus" (a student entrepreneurship club).All students from these institutions formed our study population.
This population is compartmentalised into those that are involved in practical entrepreneurship education (members of Enactus) and those who are not involved in practical entrepreneurship education (non-members of Enactus).Quota sampling frame was adopted in the selection of respondents.A total 160 Enactus students and 320 non Enactus members were selected for sampling.Structured questionnaire was designed and used as the main instrument of data collection.Six (6) Master of Business (MBA) students served as research assistants for the administration, collection and collation of the questionnaires within four (4) weeks (5 th March-4 th April 2014).Consistent with the Big Five personality traits of Zhao and Seibert (2006) as equally applied by Chen et al. (2012), the following indices were used in developing our questionnaire aimed at eliciting information from our respondents with the objective of quantifying the severity of each as the affect their entrepreneurial intentions: • Agreeableness The questionnaire used for data collection was principally scaled around these five items.This is based on entrepreneurial attitude development of attitude proposed by Zhao et al. (2005).The scales are based on Likert 5-point scale, ranging from 2 to -2 for "strongly agree", "agree", "uncertain", "disagree" and "strongly disagree" respectively.Cornbach's α of total items is 0.944.It shows that the degree of reliability of questionnaire is acceptable.
The study distributed 10 pretest questionnaires to students in one university each in south East and South-South of Nigeria.After the students answered the questions, the questionnaire was revised by extreme value analysis, item analysis, factor analysis and reliability analysis.The revised questionnaires was then distributed and collected as shown on Table 1.
After eliminating 18 questionnaires with incomplete and invalid answers all from non-Enactus students, there were 365 valid questionnaires, with a valid return rate of 96.057%.Figures of data analysis are based on "complete elimination of missing values".Data collated were analysed using the frequency distribution, severity index and paired sample t-test.

Severity Index (SI)
The severity index is a mathematical procedure for measuring likelihood of a factor being of significant importance based on perception of respondents.The expression of severity index is: (1) where R w is the number of respondents, w the weight or points assigned and R t the total no of responses obtained from that variable.In interpreting the degree of severity, the scale on the rating of the issues is: S.I ≤ 1.4 implies not of serious effect; S.I = 1.5 -2.4 implies moderately of serious effect; S.I = 2.5 -3.4 implies of serious effect; S.I ≥ 3.5 implies of very serious effect.

Paired Sample t-test
Paired observations in this paper is from students that belong to entrepreneurial clubs and those not belonging to entrepreneurial clubs that are matched for entrepreneurial personality characteristics (Agreeableness, Openness to Experience, Extraversion, Conscientiousness and Neuroticism).The paired test statistic is the difference between the paired observations, which is symbolized by d (for difference).is average difference, which has the same value as the difference between the means of the two samples.The mean of the differences is the same as the difference between the means: (2) (3) The t-value in calculated as the ratio of a statistic divided by the standard error: (4) for n-1 degrees of freedom.

RESULTS AnD DISCUSSIOnS
Table 2 shows that based on the data collected from six universities in the South-East and South-South region of Nigeria, the personality traits favourable to entrepreneurship intention (agreeableness, openness to experience, extraversion and conscientiousness) all ranked above 1.0 for students that belong to entrepreneurship clubs, while the same set of factors ranked below 0.5 for students not belonging to entrepreneurship clubs.Interestingly neuroticism, a personality trait that limits individuals from discovering their potentials ranked least for students who belong to entrepreneurship clubs; the same factor ranks highest for students that are not in any of such clubs.
The obtained result is not surprising as students who are not members of students entrepreneurial clubs are risk averse and seem motivated to be in paid employment than being in self-employment upon graduation.
The results shown in figures 2 and 3 suggest that students that belong to entrepreneurship clubs have better entrepreneurial intentions than those not belonging to any entrepreneurship club as it relates to the 5 big personality traits.The results of figure 2   belong to entrepreneurship club all replied that they want to be self-employed while 88% of student not belonging to any entrepreneurship club they will desire a paid employment while and 12% were yet to make up their minds.
From the analysis, it can be established that the high value of Neuroticism (29%) among students not belonging to entrepreneurship clubs attest to their low  self-esteem, self-confidence and achievement motivation, as well as unwillingness to venture into new undertakings which involves risk taking, while its least value in the case of students that belong to entrepreneurship club imply high level of self-confidence, self-esteem, achievement motivation, risk taking propensity and locus of control.
Table 3 results shows that the tcal value of 2.849 is significant at 0.05level, implying that within error margin of 5% a significant positive difference exist between the preponderance of student in the six universities surveyed that belong to students entrepreneurship clubs and those who do not belong to such clubs.We can therefore conclude that preponderance to entrepreneurship by students that belong to students' entrepreneurship clubs is significantly higher than that of those who are non-members of such club.The above conclusion is further reinforced by the result of the correlation of severity of personality traits towards entrepreneurship of students that belong to entrepreneurship clubs and students non-members which is -0.834, implying that membership of student entrepreneurship club has the tendency of reducing desire for paid employments by graduates by 83.4%.

COnCLUSIOnS AnD RECOMMEnDATIOn
Based on the results of our analysis, we can conclude that students who belong to entrepreneurship clubs are better prepared to venture into entrepreneurship than those who are not members of any of such organisations.The implication being that students' entrepreneurship clubs provide platforms for students to engage themselves in collaborative teams in the practice of classroom experiences for a result oriented out-of-classroom entrepreneurship education.Through this process they come in contact with business and industry leader who provide mentorship which affords them the opportunity to acquire practical skills and business experiences, thereby overcoming neuroticism which abstraction of theories learnt in classrooms, which often create and mind set of risk aversion and fear of failure in young graduates.Based on the above conclusion the paper recommend for restructuring of entrepreneurship education programme in universities in Nigeria into to ensure that the students are trained, engaged and mentored for a sustainable entrepreneurship development process.To this extent the following specific recommendations are made: • Policies and programmes that create, promote and maintenance entrepreneurial culture at all level of the university (departments, faculties and the university at large); • Recognision of out-of-classroom project time spent by students (members or volunteers) on activities of students' Entrepreneurship Clubs like Enactus as earned credit hours.This paper derives its scientific contribution on given the empirical results which emphasizes formulation result oriented entrepreneurship education curricula in Nigeria's universities that integrates: • Class room experiences on business concepts • Engaging and practicalbusinessplanning skills development that including mentoring coaching, teamwork and competitions; • Interactive industrial exposures to seasoned professional as well as networking opportunities; • Collaborative stakeholders support to students' entrepreneurship clubs through provision of resources (human and nonhuman) such as students involved in marketresearch, meeting space, seed funding, product development and business advisory services.

Figure 1 .
Figure 1.Entrepreneurship Education Partnering for Employability and 3 can also be linked to the responses from the respondents when asked what kind of employment they intend to have upon graduation.Students that 208 O.T.Ebiringa / SJM 10 (2) (2015) 201 Figure 2. Personality of Students that belong to Entrepreneurship clubs

Table 1 .
Frequency of Questionnaire Administering and Returned

Table 2 .
Preponderance of Entrepreneurial Personality of Respondents