Manipulation of perfect scores, first class, impediment to education - Folayan Ojo

A retired Don, Professor Folayan Ojo, has bemoaned the dwindling standard of education in the country, saying over manipulation of perfect scores and first class degrees are major causes.

He made this assertion at the launch and review of his second autobiography at the University of Lagos, titled "A Dream Fulfilled", five years after he wrote the first one, "My Biography".

Highlighting his educational journey from birth as well as his experiences as a father, husband, scholar, traveller and academic who has taught in several higher institutions within and outside the country, the professor of economics said education is no longer what it used to be.



Prof. Folayan said compared to the current crop of lazy students and lecturers, first class honours used to be harder in his days as an undergraduate when students were more studious.

He said: "In our days, to have a first class was like (being) a perfect human being; second class upper, also. But today, you have ten first class from a university... Most times, you have 33 to 73, it is nonsense! Who are the teachers and who are the students?

"Is it the teachers who don't want to teach or the students who don't want to learn? How do they get the first class? That is a problem."

The former Dean of the Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Lagos, having taught in Swaziland for nine years, also said that there are too many tertiary institutions in the country which is unnecessary.

He advocated for the merging of universities saying this would reduce running costs and still afford more individuals the opportunity to get university education.

Citing an example, the retired academic said South Africa has more fund, more teachers, and more facilities than her counterpart, Nigeria.

"That is why today, we Nigerians, both staff and students, rush to that country because of that innovative merging of universities", he said.

Meanwhile, Professor Emeritus, Olorunfemi Adeniji, while delivering the opening remarks, said Nigeria is losing its values, institutions, and history.

He said in order to salvage the situation, history should not be an option in our primary and secondary schools, adding that the documentation of the author's life is a right step in the right direction.

Showering encomiums on the author, Professor Kayode Oguntuase, who reviewed the book, said since the author founded the Folayan Ojo Foundation in 2003, he has continued to reward very bright students and those not so bright through his scholarship scheme.

Federal Government to set up ICT varsity - Minister of Communications.

The Minister of Communications, Barrister Abdul-Raheem Adebayo Shittu, has said the federal government is set to get a new Information and Communication Technology (ICT) university up and running.

He said the idea behind the ICT university which will be the first of its kind in Africa, was informed by the low-ranking status of Nigeria in terms of development when compared to other African countries.

He said since "ICT has become the greatest enabler of today, and the future prosperity of tomorrow", it was high time Nigeria filled the gap in the ICT industry by taking its rightful place in terms of acquiring requisite knowledge.

Speaking on the Nigerian Academy of Engineering 2017 Annual lecture, which also included the induction of new fellows and life achievement awards which was held at the University of Lagos, the minister called on the academy to partner with the ministry of communications in setting up this university which he assured, will be "run as a public-private partnership".

He said, "I want to invite your academic to partner with the ministry of communications in the setting up of this ICT university of Nigeria.

"If your academy is disposed to, we are prepared to cede one of the campus of the six campuses to you, so we can jointly run it to ensure that we get the best ICT training".

Acknowledging the mammoth of tertiary institutions where engineering is taught in Nigeria, the minister said they are not enough and that the federal government will continue to emphasize on the need for more technological training.

He said he would always do his best as an intermediary between the academy and the presidency for whatever networking or contact the academy might need to further it interests.

Corroborating the Minister of Communications, Professor Michael Adewumi, while delivering a lecture titled: "Training Engineers for the Global Century", said he believes Nigeria need to train globally-competitive and locally-relevant engineers.

He said in order to achieve that, the tutelage of engineering in Nigeria needs to surmount the problems of one-dimensional training, ignorance of local context, and the expectation of employment in multinationals upon graduation.

Proffering more solutions, the Pennsylvania State University lecturer, maintained that local knowledge must be integrated by not ignoring the gift, skills and knowledge that students have been able to gather.

"To train a successful engineer, we must have a seamless integration between what they already experience and what they need to know.

"For example, while teaching gaming theory or probability, why not focus on the game of 'Ayo' instead of baseball", he said.

He also said three-dimensional education which involves diversifying the curriculum, as well as creative application of solutions from the local to global stage is essential if Nigeria is to have locally-relevant engineers.

Meanwhile, former minister of Works and Housing, Senator Barnabas Germade, who was inducted at the event, lauded the selection process, and said that "it is the application of engineering laws that qualifies one to become a fellow of the Nigerian Academy of Engineering".

He hoped that the induction will only inspire him and the Seven others, to do more in promoting engineering practice and to support all forms of development that engineering fosters.

posted from Bloggeroid

UNILAG Screening for 2017/2018 Academic Session Begins

The University of Lagos will begin the screening of prospective students from August 9.

The message below from its website spells the schedule and process students are to follow.

The University of Lagos online registration for the Screening Exercise for Admission into ALL COURSES/PROGRAMMES for the 2017/2018 Academic Year will commence from Wednesday, August 9 to Wednesday, August 31, 2017.

ELIGIBLE CANDIDATES:
Candidates who made University of Lagos their first choice in the 2017 UTME and scored 200 and above are eligible for the screening. In addition, candidates must possess five (5) credit passes at one sitting in relevant O/level subjects including English Language and Mathematics.

Candidates, who will not be sixteen (16) years of age by Tuesday, October 31, 2017 are not eligible and need not apply.
Candidates who are awaiting results are also eligible to apply for the screening. Such candidates will be allowed to upload their results when they are released only if they applied within the specified period. Candidates are advised to check the University website for the specified period.

SCREENING FEE: – N2,500
REGISTRATION PROCEDURE:
Eligible candidates should log on to University website www.unilag.edu.ng . Then, take the following steps:
Click on Full-Time Undergraduate Admission

Click on Post-UTME Screening
Login with UTME number and surname in lowercase as password
Generate payment advice
Proceed to any commercial bank to make payment.

Return to the Unilag portal to complete the screening form
NOTE: Candidates will be required to upload their O’level results to complete the application.

ENQUIRIES:
Further clarification may be obtained via email:
admissions@unilag.edu.ng and the following phone numbers: 08182716045, 07046537158, 07043359831 and 08182716045.
Candidates are advised to adhere strictly to the guidelines and obtain necessary clarifications.

Dr. (Mrs.) Taiwo F. Ipaye, FNIM
Registrar and Secretary to the Council.

posted from Bloggeroid

Don Harps on War Cessation, Advocates Peace Education



A university don has called on the Nigerian government to include subjects that teaches peace in the curriculum of the country's educational system.

Dr. Babatunde Oni, an Associate Professor of Law at the University of Lagos, made this call while delivering a speech at the Faculty of Law, UNILAG, with the theme: "Declaration of Peace and Cessation of War - Implementation of the Sustainable Development of DPCW," organised by Heavenly Culture World Peace and Restoration of Light (HWPL), a non-governmental organisation.

He said to do this, government must ensure that subjects on peace education are not only taught on the grassroot level, but must encompass all levels of education in the country.

He however, said that teachers must be trained, first of all, and then a total transformation and review be followed on the primary and secondary school curriculum to include peace education.

"As Nigerians, we believe that we need peace. There's also need for us to maintain peace. So in order to start telling people about peace, we believe there should be an introduction of what we call 'Integration of Peace' into the Nigerian curriculum.

"We don't have peace education as a course of study except in masters degrees as being run by some universities (in Nigeria)

"So we are trying to bring in peace education so that from elementary and primary school up to secondary school, they (children) will imbibe the culture of peace," he said.

Also, Mr. Lee Man-Hee, the chairman of HWPL, said in a message from Korea, that there's no need to fight war as war doesn't bring positive changes.

Speaking at the seminar, Kingson Uwandu, the Legal Officer of Dataflex Nigeria Limited, stated that peace must coincide with justice.

According to Kingson, "positive peace advocates just behaviours", and sees to it that the right thing is done and that no person is treated unfairly.

Mr. Kingson also observed that there cannot be meaningful development where peace is lacking.

He said war torn countries and communities experience high level of backwardness, citing Nigeria during the civil war and northern states ravaged by insurgency as excellent examples.

Meanwhile, Mr. Olorunfemi Franklin, while delivering a paper titled, "The Golden Thread of peace From Now Into Generations Unborn," said creating a peace life, municipally and internationally, would engender peace in the long run.

He said this can be done by making peace legislations locally and internationally so that including peace education would help pass the barton to coming generations.

UNILAG reinstates rusticated students

The management of the University of Lagos has reinstated two of the students recently rusticated for various misconducts.

The students, Lawrence Umezinwa, and Polycarp Ochuba, from the department of Political Science, were served rustication letters about two months ago for involving in the 2015 bedbug protest which resulted in the total replacement of mattresses in the school's halls of residence.

Mr. Polycarp has received his letter while Mr. Lawrence who claimed to have nothing to do with the protest confirmed that he had been notified of a letter absolving him of the accusation.




He said the letter has been dropped off at his department and believes the content is the same with what is contained in the one Mr. Polycarp received.

UNILAG Staff School Wins Hanson Maths Competition, Produces Top Seven

The University of Lagos Staff School on Saturday, won the Hanson Mathematics Competition for the 4th time in a row.


Having won hosting rights on the strength of their previous performance, the school hosted and produced the first top seven performers for the first time in the history of the competition, with Ifeanyi Anyagwa leading the pack in first position.


Similarly, the school had won the Nigerian Tulip International Colleges and National Mathematical Centre annual mathematics competition for primary pupils earlier this month, beating other contestants to the prize.


Speaking on the reason behind the school’s success over the years, the Headmistress, Mrs. Nkemjika Uzoaga, revealed that the school had always paraded teachers who are not only sound, but also dedicated.


She said that the school, despite shortage of resources and adequate infrastructure, had always done better than its sister school, the University of Lagos Women Society School who has everything.


She said: “We don’t have air conditioners in our class, in fact, if you go to our classrooms, you’d think staff school is a public school.


“But because it’s a university school, it’s a prestigious thing to bear that name. And if we all claim and agree that university of Lagos is a university of first choice and nation’s pride, a school that you name after it should also fit into the same description”.


The Headmistress however, lauded the effort of the University management for doing their best in terms of retaining staffers and prompt payment of salaries as at when due.


Meanwhile, the mathematics teacher of the winners, Mr. Odubiyi Solomon, who has been teaching in the school for the past ten years, has attributed the success to hard work, determination and perseverance.


Showering encomiums on the winner, Mr. Odubiyi said Ifeanyi behaves well in the class; participates in class activities; listens well and enjoys class lessons.


He said pupils hoping to tow the footsteps of Ifeanyi should endeavour to always do their assignments in good time, work on their own and be independent.


“I believe in the independency of the children, not waiting for teachers to teach them everything but to research…quite a number of them (the winners) have been doing it, and they have been very consistent”, he said.


The other winners include Adewumi Adedunmola, 2nd place; Lawal Gihad, 3rd place; Udo Goodness, 4th place; followed by Alimi Rohanat, Akeju Obaloluwa, and Segun Soji-John.

Our paradise our war zone

“O God, I don’t want to die,” I winced as I crawled to seek a hideout after collecting two bullets in my belly. The gunman who shot me wanted to be positive he made the kill, so he stealthily walked in my direction. Between half trying to stem the bleeding on my belly and trying to hide, he closed me in. Slowly, he raised his gun to my head. “Please don’t kill me,” I begged. “Have mercy. I am the only child of my parents,” I lied, hoping by it to supplant his intent.

He took a quick unfazed look at his environment; hither and thither, as if to make sure his prey wasn’t up for competition. Of course I was going to die at his pleasure. All I could muster were tears borne out of self-pity. I waited as he closed his finger on the trigger. He could have put my lights out the next second, but thankfully, I woke up! Oh, I woke up and it had all been a dream!

The morning was very chilly. My window and door still swaying to the music from the self-same Northern wind that had me under sheets all night as I dreamed on. I sneaked a peek at the clock and frowned. It was past nine on the AM. I had overslept. I cursed the weather. It was the second time I was overdoing the call of nature twice in a row. With laboured firepower, I disengaged the sheets and dragged my torso off the bed. I had had a terrible dream where I was shot twice, but who cares? If only dreams were the utopian wizardry that would catch us a glimpse of what is to come. "That'd be pretty special," I silently mused.

I was already at the window overlooking a sea of houses which – until that very moment – had held fond but latent childhood memories. Now they mean nothing other than what a total stranger would perceive of them; just houses and streets.

I rested beside the window and expertly parted its curtains like the red sea. From whence I was pitched, I looked down. My little castle, I beg to call it that, is a three storey building and I was holed up in a little room on the last floor. Inasmuch as I hated doing the stairs, I liked this room. The position was vantage. I could amuse myself with a 280 degree view of happenings down south.

Down, children were playing. Unruly dirty little urchins. One had soiled my shoes the other day and I'd sent his dentition on different errands. I dashed away before his mother could front a protest.

I looked hard at them and fresh images debuted. Dirty grotesque piccaninnies whose mien is a perfect reflection of the very nadir our communal subsistence have been reduced to. Where the line that separates the haves and have nots thickens with each passing day, and which for want of an apt appellation, I call "the deepening gulf."

More people would go hungry today. It was a fact. All the same, I shuddered at the revelation. I would rather pitch thought and intent on pressing matters of very personal nature, but I knew I'd always come back to this, some way, somehow. So I took my note and poured everything I saw into it.

Heading down to the main road, was Mr. Oche. He probably has nothing in his wallet and hopes to beg a few willing do-gooders for transport fare to his place of work. Mama Maria barely survived the night with her five kids but was out and about. Any job goes. Of course the toddlers have to be fed for that day. The insidious labour which add years of wrinkles to a few months' toil.

Reminds me the day my uncle had sauntered into my school. I saw him the previous year and seeing him that day broke my heart. He looked worn out and way older than his age, assuming the demeanour of one desperately trying to make sense of a senile situation. Indeed, he wanted to start a Masters programme decades after he had left the university. He had sought for answers like the rest and had come to a rather misguided conclusion: that another degree was tantamount to good life. I felt sorry for him. But it was near impossible to persuade a mind whose resolve had eroded every form of reason. I dared not try. Like the people I now see, he had been institutionalized. He had joined the red fellowship of penury.

Never before have I seen a hardworking man fighting tooth and nail to put food on the table. That same river of misery now flows through most homes. It was already hard detaching pain from poverty. What difference does it make? As far as the majority is concerned, they have become one, like the Bible’s pronouncement on newlyweds. For better for worse; inseparable till wealth do them part.

But of course, there are times when ‘for worse’ becomes the reality of a newlywed. When ends no longer meet. When the bad times distort the good, and their paradise turns a war zone. Chinua Achebe of blessed memory wrote an epistle of this theme. ‘Things Fall Apart’ he calls it. Here, in the homes of the beggarly, is a full-blown war; things have fallen apart.

And a full-blown war it is. A fight directed, not to the common foe, or the oppressor, or the one who sits on the communal yam, but to the co-dweller. Child to father and father to mother. The family tears itself apart. Anger-venting made easy. After all, the oppressor is far beyond reach; therefore, let us – by the heat of our frustration – consume each other.

For we will continue to work on bent backs, night and day. We will continue to want bread and coverings for the cold night. And we will not stop howling when we should. For now, though, let our paradise be our war zone.


Daniel Chukwu
08063756358