Vocational courses are courses that are tailored and meant to prepare people for a skilled craft rather than academic work.
Vocational courses, when studied by an individual, give such individual the leverage to be fully self-employed without the need of working for a company in order to be employed.
It is not a mystery or an illusion that the vocational courses in recent days have provided a stable source of income for those who finished studying the course due to its ongoing and increasing demand and also its ability to stand in the midst of all technological progress, especially in the area of artificial intelligence.
Vocational Course Duration and Certificate
Vocational courses, unlike academic courses, do not usually take a longer period of time, with some vocational courses taking at most 6 months to 2 years for some tough vocational skills.
Vocational courses, just like academic courses, are usually accompanied by a certificate, and the certificate depends extensively on the country you are staying in.
Using Nigeria as a case study for vocational course certificates, for example, if you attend technical school, you will be awarded NBTE to show you have completed the course, and you can work with the certificate.
If you are in Nigeria and you have undertaken a vocation course, you can opt for an international certificate like the Red Seal or CompTIA.
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Best Vocational Courses to Study
Completing vocational courses and getting its certificate can provide you with a more stable source of income than a degree program holder, and that is why you should consider obtaining a vocational course certificate.
There are a lot of vocational courses available, but we will limit the list to the best vocational skill that is currently in demand and will be in the future. Below are the best vocational courses in Nigeria and outside Nigeria.
1.Electrical Installation and Maintenance
Electricity, since its invention, has become a necessary part of daily human life. Electricity powers our homes, powers up our appliances, and generates heat during cold periods, and it is used in factories to keep operations going.
The boom in housing in Nigeria also comes with one demand: electricity installation and maintenance, and these are done by well-known professionals who possess the certificate.
Electrical installation and maintenance tips the list of best vocational courses because of its high demand locally and internationally and has remained one skill that is unfinged by the advent of artificial intelligence.
The electrical installation and maintenance course will teach you how to set up electrical systems in buildings and how to safely distribute electricity throughout an entire building with proper maintenance of the electrical components that power up a building.
A lucrative course—that is what Electrical Installation and Maintenance is, costing over thousands of naira and even going up to millions of naira when you conduct installation or maintenance of electrical systems in buildings as a professional.
2.Welding and Fabrication
Welding and fabrication remain the top 2 demanded skills in Nigeria and across the globe based on the world use of metal for construction and mainly due to the rising use of metal technology for transportation and other uses like the communication network system.
When welding and fabrication are the same method and skill of making metalwork for human use, they are distinct when metal fabrication is the overall process of manufacturing metal and welding is just one part of the fabrication process.
When fabrication and welding are distinct, however, both welders and metal fabricators can do each other’s jobs when presented with the same challenges.
Basically in Nigeria the terms “fabrication” and “welding” do not exist in the common sense; everyone uses the term “welding,” and the professionals in this term handle both the fabrication and welding tasks.
The Welding and Fabrication course will teach you and cover a wide range of topics, including welding technique, welding safety, welding codes and standards, blueprint reading, and material science, while also touching on the cutting, bending, and forming of metals and other materials.
Welding and fabrication is a top-demand skill globally, and it is expected to grow more than other skills due to advancing human technology and construction.
3. Plumbing Technology
Plumbing has become the necessity of the 21st-century home. From toilet installation to the running of water across various rooms in the building, plumbing has become an essential necessity for every home for perfect and seamless operation in the home.
The Plumbing Technology course will teach how to design, install, and repair residential and commercial plumbing systems, even extending to hydronic heating systems.
For the plumbing technology course, you will also acquire relevant skills like joining different types of pipe together, reading blueprints of homes, and installing and repairing boilers, plumbing fixtures, faucets, and water heaters.
The best thing about the plumbing technology course is that professionals of this course enjoy a high demand for their job due to the fact that plumbing is not only installed in the house but also has to be maintained or repaired most times.
Plumbing as a profession is expected to add over 40,000 new jobs yearly based on the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics.
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4.Hairdressing and Cosmetology
We are in the beauty age, where a lot of people are obsessed about looking good, especially for females, and that is why hairdressing and cosmetology should be considered as one of the best skills to acquire due to demand and the stable source of income if a variety of factors are in place.
Hairdressing and cosmetology as vocational courses are usually taken together, but both are different in some contexts, but the holder or professional of hairdressing or cosmetology can do two of the skills together based on the fact that hairdressing and cosmetology are interrelated.
While hairdressing courses will focus on how to provide hair services, cosmetology can teach you to beautify more than just hair, extending to nails and body, like makeup, skincare services, and others.
For clarity and professionalism, it is advisable that both courses be taken together in order to expand your knowledge pertaining to hair services and body beautification.
5. Fashion Design and Tailoring
Clothing is among the most human needs after food and shelter, and that is why tailoring and fashion design are considered one of the best vocational skills due to their importance and relevance to the society at large.
Fashion design and tailoring are the same set of skills that can be learned by studying it as a course, but some percentage of people still consider fashion designing and tailoring as not the same skill.
Fashion designing focuses on the artistic and cultural aspect of clothing, which can be driven by trends, celebrity influence, and social media, and they can also create an original design, prototype, and patterns, while tailoring involves the skillful cutting, sewing, altering, and finishing of fabrics to create a custom cloth that requires precise cutting.
Fashion designing and tailoring can be learned both together as a course, or you can learn either of them independently, but it is necessary that you learn both together to max the benefit from the skill.
Fashion design and tailoring as a course can be learned in a period of 6 months to over 3 years, depending on your ability to learn things quickly.
6. Mobile Phone Repairs
Nigeria has 150 million mobile phones, and with over 4 billion mobile phones used all over the world, gaining expertise on repairing mobile phones is a good skill to learn based on the demand.
With a large number of phones used across the globe, sometimes these devices might run into some fault, and this will require them to be repaired, and this will require the skill of expertise.
The Mobile Repairs course will cover screen repair and replacement, battery replacement, software troubleshooting and updates, hardware repairs, water damage repair, unlocking, and network issues.
The Mobile Phone Repairs course will take at least 6 months before even learning the basics of phone repairs and might take up to a year for advanced phone repairs like software repairs.
7.Automobile Repair and Maintenance
Automobile Repair and Maintenance is one of the best vocational courses that can be learned due to high demand and also the use of cars as an important means of transportation compared to others.
Automobiles need to be repaired and maintained. Whether it is newly bought or fairly bought, it still has to be maintained, also due to the fact that it uses an engine, which will develop faults during the lifespan of the car.
With over 140 million cars used in Nigeria and over 1 billion cars used globally, with the tendency to increase, automobile repair and maintenance expertise will increase greatly, and that is why it is considered the best to learn based on these statistics.
The Automobile Repairs and Maintenance vocational course will cover details like routine servicing, engine repairs, electrical faults, suspension issues, and other automobile-related issues.
Conclusion
Mentioned above are the best among the best vocational courses that can be studied across the world, while not limiting it to Nigeria alone.
The best vocational courses are the courses with enough potential to let the professional succeed in the outside world within a month or couple of months after finishing the completion of the course.
If eventually any of the courses we mentioned above does not align with any of your interests for vocational skills, you can choose the one that aligns with your interest.
