Uchechukwu Nnaike
30 June 2009
Lagos — Executive Secretary of the National Universities Commission (NUC), Prof. Julius Okojie has called on universities in the country to give out honourary degrees sparingly so as to guard against the abuse of such awards.
Okojie made this call at the fourth convocation ceremony of Covenant University, Ota Ogun State, tagged, 'The Release of Eagles 2009'.
According to the Executive Secretary, represented by Prof. Chiedu Mafiana, although honourary degrees were avenues through which universities bring town and gown together, he warned universities to take heed so that these gowns were not torn by those who do not know their value.
On the proliferation of illegal universities, he expressed concern that there were about 45 of these universities, and that the number was almost half of the approved ones. He advised parents and desperate admission seekers to be mindful of the universities they attend, as the commission had entered into partnership with the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) and the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) to rid the country of illegal universities.
He lauded the federal government's decision to encourage public private partnership in education, which he said had increased access to tertiary education.
Chancellor of the university, Dr. David Oyedepo said unless the Federal Government makes education its priority and injects timely and relevant actions to its policies, the country's vision of becoming one of the 20 top economies by 2020 would not be attained.
He expressed concern over the neglect of the education sector in the country, saying that education was crucial to the attainment of the seven point agenda of the federal government, without which, the agenda would be mere day dreams. "Education has proved to be the vehicle for national transformation in human history. No nation ever rises above her investment in education. Africa was once the world's leading civilisation, but that was when she was leading in education. But when we lost our place in education, we lost our place in civilisation."
He called on the government to set its priorities right and give the necessary attention to the education sector.
The Vice-Chancellor, Prof. Aize Obayan said the ceremony was unique because it was the first time the university would be graduating students from all its programmes and that it was also a time it graduated its first set of international students. "This validates our goal of raising a platform for qualitative education, where total graduates are packaged along the defining parameters of our vision to go out and make a difference to their world."
A total of 1,096 students were awarded bachelors degree in various fields and that out of this number, 80 made First Class Honours; 565, Second Class Honours (Upper Division); 415, Second Class Honours (Lower Division) and, 36 Third Class. For the postgraduate programmes, she said 19 scholars were awarded Masters of Science (M.Sc), while three bagged Doctoral degree.
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