… As Covenant University graduates 1,426

From: Bianca Iboma

 A  former Vice President and Secretary General of  African Development Bank (ADB), Ms Cecilia Akintomide, has urged the Federal Government to review the funds and allocation set aside for public universities in the country.

Akintomide said that there had been inadequate funding of public institution, which makes graduates from such institutions unemployable especially with the advancement of technology where a lot of innovation was needed to make learning more creative and attractive.

She made this statement during the 12th Convocation ceremony and conferment of Honorary Doctorate Degrees as well as  the presentation of Prizes to graduates of  Covenant University, Ota, Ogun State .

The ceremony witnessed a total of 188 students at the weekend bagging First Class degrees of 1,426 students graduated in the 2016/2017 academic session while, 568 had Second class upper honours and 322 with Second class lower,47 with third class and 301 post graduate students  of Covenant University at the weekend.

Akintomide, who was the Guest Speaker at the event,  presented a paper on “Leadership by product, the role of University.”

She said that  the resources available for public universities to thrive in the country was limited and products from such environment usually do not get enough knowledge, equally not equipped to meet up the challenge provided by technology and it becomes difficult to proffer solution to the emerging challenges provided due to the limited resources saying that students had to study under strenuous conditions thereby affecting their productivity.

” Nigerian Academia are too quiet especially when we have innovative minds that  can move the nation forward”, she said.

According to her,universities are know by their products, graduates are the products tertiary institutions showcase to the world.With the advancement of technology more research and sophisticated gadgets is needed for the equipping of  the nation’s students.”Nigeria cannot continue to maintain a low statuesque in the educational sector”, she noted.

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Vice Chancellor, Covenant University, Prof. Adeyemi Atayero; Chancellor and Chairman, Dr. David Oyedepo; his wife, Pastor (Mrs.) Faith Oyedepo and Keynote Speaker and former Vice-President and Secretary General, African development Bank, Ms. Cecilia Akintomide

Akintomide stressed that Africa and the world expect to see innovations and development from Nigerian students, saying that the Federal Government should provide tuition free education for those who cannot afford to pay fees and those who can pay should pay their tuition fee so that everyone would have access to education she said.

She enjoined  the Federal Government to improve on the fund  allocated for the education of public university as poor funding is what has hinder it growth and progress she pointed out.

Vice Chancellor of Covenant University, Prof. Aderemi Aaron Atayero, urged tertiary institution in the country to embraced research and innovative programmes  in the various course of studies in order to developed fresh minds of the  students  beyond the traditional way of learning.

 Atayero said that  the  institution has been able to make connections between theory and practice through creativity saying they had trained a set of expert thinkers that would become world changers in few years. and solution providers.

He added that Covenant University has continued to be at the cutting edge of innovation and research oriented programmes that has distinguished the students and make them compete with their counterpart at world class level.

He cited some of the achievement of the school and success recorded by the students at both national and international level, setting the pace for other public and private institutions he stated.

Also, Chancellor of the institution, Dr. David Oyedepo, said that the 2016 of Nigerian Graduate Report had ranked the products of the institution as the most employable graduates among Nigerian institution.

 Oyedepo said that  most of the nation’s challenges needed indigenous solutions rather than foreign ones.

“Nigeria found itself where it is by choice, adding that it was time individuals and leaders took the responsibilities of proffering solutions to the nation’s problems.

Education is the instrument that can enhance such initiative in solving the numerous challenges threaten the stability and productive process of socio- economic growth,”  he said.