Nigeria Universities Updates

Like in the United Kingdom and the United States, soon, public and private universities in Nigeria will be ranked.

The ranking will be done by the National Universities Commission (NUC). The universities are learning the criteria to be used to determine their standing on the academic ladder.

Some of the criteria include staffing, facilities, endowments, and career well-being of alumni.

Speaking at a media luncheon penultimate week, Vice-Chancellor of Caleb University, Imota in Ikorodu, Lagos, Prof. Ayodeji Olukoju, said the institution is taking pains to ensure it meets standards in all areas, especially as its Pro-Chancellor, Prof Olorun-nimbe Adedipe, who has served on the NUC committee in charge of the rankings, has warned that it would not be business as usual.

“The NUC has developed a template for programme and institutional accreditation. Our Pro-Chancellor has told us that this is a different ball game. They would be looking at staffing, facilities such as hotels, laboratories and offices; how much the university gets in terms of external support; and where do our students go after graduation,” he said.

Prof. Amos Akinwande, Head of the Chemistry Department, added more details about what the regulatory body would look out for.

“They would look at the total environment whether it is conducive for learning. With regards to staffing, they would look at the staff profile. All lecturers should not be all professors alone. Professors should make up 20 per cent, senior lecturers, 35 per cent, other cadres, 45 per cent, as well as the number of technical staff – one to four lecturers.

“They will also look at how many of the staff has PhDs; your libraries and e-journals, and how up to date your website is. The reason that the NUC is doing this is that many universities have website but they are empty unlike foreign universities,” he said.

However, Olukoju was quick to note that the Caleb University website was up to date, even to the profile of all its lecturers.

Other areas the NUC would examine are: the integrity of the system – the Senate, Governing Council, Bursary, Registry, and Internal and External publications.

Confident that the Caleb University, which is in its fourth year, would rank high, Prof Sunday Ajayi, Dean, College of Pure and Applied Sciences, said the institution’s science laboratories are well equipped with the latest research tools.

“The NUC team that came for the accreditation of our laboratories was quite impressed with the much we have. We have three research equipment installed. We did that because we want to be ready for postgraduate research when the time comes,” he said.

The first set of students admitted in the school will graduate June this year and the principal officers can swear by the quality of degrees they would receive.

The Vice-Chancellor defended the university’s stance on code of conduct for its students, which is more stringent that what obtains in public tertiary institutions. He said restraining the students’ freedom is necessary to produce graduates who can take up leadership with integrity in future.

“Here at Caleb, we want to create the new personality. We cannot afford to reproduce the run-off-the-mill humdrum routine university graduate. If we have to force feed our youths, we have to do just that. They call it regimentation. Out of 100 per cent, if we get 45 per cent to comply, I will be satisfied. We only need the crucial 10 or 20 per cent to go out there and make a change,” he said.

In five years, Olukoju said he envisions a student population increase of up to 10,000 occasioned by the adoption of the Open Distance Learning platform which would take education to more people beyond its campus.

Popularity: 8% [?]

Only 13 universities in the country are certified by the Pharmacists Council of Nigeria (PCN) and the National Universities Commission (NUC) to run Pharmacy programme, the Registrar and Chief Executive Officer of PCN, Pharmacist Ahmed Mora, disclosed this on Wednesday.

The 13 universities, according to him, are University of Ibadan (UI); Obafemi Awolowo University (OAU), Ile-Ife; University of Lagos (Unilag); Niger Delta University, Yenagoa; Madonna University, Elele, Rivers State; University of Maiduguri, University of Benin, and Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria.

Others are University of Jos; Olabisi Onabanjo University, Ago Iwoye; University of Nigeria, Nsukka; Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka and University of Uyo, Akwa Ibom.

Addressing a press conference on the activities of the council, the PCN Registrar said: “As of today, 13 faculties of Pharmacy are recognised by the PCN to run Pharmacy programmes.”

Popularity: 100% [?]

Twenty-seven undergraduates and graduates have been nominated Google Ambassadors in Africa. Eighteen of them are from Nigerian universities.

Abiodun Adepoju, a 300-Level Computer Science student in the University of Ibadan, is one of the ambassadors. They are to act as liaisons between Google and their universities for one year. The programme, which is on a volunteer basis, is an opportunity for students who are thrilled by technology, involved in their school communities and major in courses like Computer Science and related fields.

In another development, the Association of Faculty of Arts Students (AFAS), University of Ibadan, held a leadership summit. The summit began with a talk from Mr Muyiwa Akande on

Excellent leadership.

He was of the belief that leadership is “a set of characteristics, behavioural patterns and personal attributes that makes goals achievable.”

The second speaker, Mr Adeoye Adekola, spoke on Leadership and time management. Having spent five years in the university for a four-year course, he eventually graduated with a third class degree in Economics. However, rather than be depressed, he has unleashed the leadership potentials in him and is today working in a communications company as a dealer sales specialist team leader. Adeoye’s major contribution to the discourse was that “our lives are consequences of the decisions we took at one time or the other.”

Finally, Mr. Abayomi Awokola spoke on Leadership and finance. An engineer by training but a banker presently, he maintained that proper book-keeping was an indispensable attribute of an accountable leader. He believed that if people take posterity into account for whatever they do, they would maintain a clean financial record.

Another personality that graced the occasion was the Dean of the Faculty, Prof P. A. Ogundeji, who admonished the participants to put into practice all they heard from the resource persons.

Popularity: 4% [?]

As the Lagos State Polytechnic (LASPOTECH), Ikorodu sends off three sets of its graduates today, the Rector, Mr Babatunde Iginla, has assured them that they can stand on their own.

Addressing journalists ahead of the 19th Convocation of the institution for more than 5,000 students of the 2006/2007, 2007/2008, and 2008/2009 sessions, Iginla said during their stay for both National Diploma (ND) and Higher National Diploma (HND) programmes of the institution, they were equipped with entrepreneurial skills in addition to certificates of their courses of study.

“I can assure you that our graduates are ready to face the challenges of the society because of their exposure to entrepreneurial strategies,” he said. He explained that LASPOTECH began a programme in this regard in the ‘80s – long before the National Board for Technical Education (NBTE) made entrepreneurship mandatory for polytechnics.

In deploying the content of the polytechnic’s entrepreneurship programme, Iginla said the students are grouped based on areas of interested and mandated to come up with projects they must implement successfully.

“This is a course designed to be practical-oriented because the products are meant to become employers of labour. They have to work on a project and bring back results. Whatever they have manufactured, they would be expected to market and sell. A lot of analysis would be done to determine whether they make profit. It is like a jumping pad for our students to go into the future and use their brains and hands,” he said.

Iginla also expressed the hope that the polytechnic would soon get degree-awarding status.Already, he said they have sent a proposal on it to the Lagos State Government but that they had to wait until the Federal Government upgrades the Yaba College of Technology and the Kaduna Polytechnics to universities to learn from them.

However, when this finally happens, expectedly by next year, Iginla said LASPOTECH would still retain its ND component while phasing out the HND.

“Our main feedstock will not be regular school certificate holders but those already into technical education. We will accept only those with ND. We will still run National Diploma but there will be no HND,” he said.

Popularity: 3% [?]

The Registrar of the Joint Admissions and Matriculations Board, Prof ‘Dibu Ojerinde, has said the Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME) remains the de facto examination required for admissions into tertiary institutions.

Ojerinde berated some institutions that have flouted Federal Government’s directives on the conduct of Post-UTME, saying that UTME is only attractive to them because of the pecuniary motives.

“JAMB’s, integrity as a credible public examination body would not be compromised. For us at JAMB we will strive to make the integrity of our examinations sacrosanct,” he said.

With new measures such as biometric capturing, Ojerinde assured that the examination would even be more thorough.

“We have introduced Biometric Capturing of thumps, i.e. thump-printing of our candidates before they are admitted to write our examinations, this is a panacea to im-personalisation and a check on examination malpractice,” he said.

According to the statement signed by JAMB’s Public Relations Officer, Mr. Timothy Oyedeji, Ojerinde blamed the insistence of some universities on Post-UTME on the fact that they see the post-examination as an alternative means of revenue generation.

While the Registrar admitted that some institutions are complying with the directive not to charge more than N1,000 as post-UTME fees, he said the list of the errant institutions has been forwarded to the Federal Ministry of Education.

Mallam Aminu Abba of the National Universities Commission (NUC) claimed that the aim is to undermine JAMB and that some institutions are determined to ensure that they admit only the best hence post-UTME is just in consonant with that resolve.

Popularity: 6% [?]