As part of its Corporate Social Responsibility(CSR) drive and effort to equip young Nigerians with relevant work-ready digital skills, Polaris Bank in partnership with the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) and NerdzFactory has commenced a high-impact capacity-building workshop on digital skills for 5,000 National Youth Service Corps members across 12 states in Nigeria.

The Bank explained that her action is intended to equip young Nigerians with relevant work-ready digital skills which is focused on building the youth’s self-sustenance in innovation, creativity, digital skills, business acumen, and relevance in the 21st-century economy and workplace.

According to Polaris Bank’s Group Head, Product & Market Development, Mrs. Adebimpe Ihekuna, “This partnership is part of Polaris Bank’s commitment to Youth development and empowerment in Nigeria which aligns with the Bank’s strategic CSR pillars.”

According to her, “We see the need for a work-ready and digitally equipped youth which has informed Polaris Bank’s partnership with NerdzFactory to make a difference and provide 5,000 NYSC members with digital skills needed to start a successful career in paid employment or create their own businesses as entrepreneurs,”.

Additionally, Mrs. Ihekuna noted that “As an enterprise poised to meet the financial needs of Nigerian Youths in the digital age, especially in post-COVID-19 era with its attendant challenges, we want to equip as many young Nigerians as possible, with requisite digital skills to give them a good head-start and help them achieve economic stability.”

The high-impact training which will run across two quarters comprises courses such as: basic digital literacy; cyber security; data science; product design; software development (back end); product management; blockchain technology; mobile app development; 3D and virtual reality; and software development (front end).

Participating corps members from 12 states of the country including Lagos, Ogun, Osun, Oyo, Abuja, Kaduna, Kano, Plateau, Delta, Rivers, Enugu, and Imo will benefit from this initiative.

It would be recalled that Polaris Bank in conjunction with Digivate 360 ran similar digital training across eight (8) locations: Lagos, Enugu, Abuja, Kano, Ilorin, Port Harcourt, Abeokuta, and Benin in 2019 and 2020, respectively.

Polaris Bank is re-defining banking products and services that meet the needs of individuals and businesses. The bank was adjudged Digital Bank of the Year 2021 and 2022