The Vice Chancellor of the University of Ilorin, Professor Wahab Egbewole, SAN, has expressed the desire of his administration to fully automate all processes at the University by the end of the third quarter of this year.
Speaking at a meeting with a delegation of the Swedish-Nigeria Educational Technology Solution Company, otherwise known as SchoolTry, saying “the University is doing everything worth doing towards positioning itself as a global player in the field of education with the help of automation.”
The Vice Chancellor particularly highlighted the desire to automate the admission processes as he also envisioned a situation where prospective admission seekers won’t have any physical interaction with any University official from the point of post-UTME to their eventual commencement of lectures.
Prof. Egbewole, who is a Council Member of the Chartered Institute of Management and Leadership, said, “We want to establish our ‘UNILORIN factors,’ becoming renowned for our reputation in seamless automated processes”.
To achieve this, the Vice Chancellor directed all units of the University to begin to adhere to the new thinking, adding that, the goal is to alleviate pressures on staff members and enhance efficiency in operations, including result generation, processing, and uploading.
The Vice Chancellor also pointed out the need to transform current manual operations within the University, citing an example from the Registrar’s office. He envisioned an automated approval process for correspondences, where the Vice Chancellor or any other official of the University can approve or comment on letters before they proceed to the next recipient.
This approach, according to Prof. Egbewole, would ensure information security, prevent misplacement, and allow global accessibility to critical communications.
Speaking further: “At the preliminary stage, the identity of the three presenters who wanted to partner the University on the development of a new portal was unknown to us. Yet the management was persuaded by SchoolTry’s presentation from day one, leading to the establishment of a successful relationship. It became evident to all that SchoolTry was the right choice, and we are grateful for the decision, as we have not experienced any regret.
“Our visit to Sweden proved enlightening, revealing SchoolTry’s connections with the Nigerian Embassy, prominent facilities like the Epic Centre (the largest innovating centre), and Karolinska Medical University with around 600 startups.This implies that, beyond our collaboration with SchoolTry, we now have the opportunity to interact with these other organisations”.
