UNILORIN gets NUC accreditation teams’ commendations

The University of Ilorin has played host to several accreditation panels, raised by the National Universities Commission (NUC) for the purpose of assessing some academic programmes in the institution.

Among the programmes slated for assessment were Accounting, Business Administration, Agriculture, Food Science, Home Economics, Christian Religious Studies, English Language, the Performing Arts, as well as History and International Studies.

At the end of the exercise, the panel members took turns to commend the University administration for the giant developmental strides recorded by the institution.

In his remarks, while submitting his report, the leader of the Accreditation Panel for the assessment of the academic programmes of English, Linguistics and Nigerian Languages, Prof. Nicholas Akwanya, said that members of the team were “quite impressed” with what they saw.

Prof. Akwanya, who came from the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, said, “We arrived on the 27th of November for this function and we were well received by the Dean of Arts and the Heads of English and Linguistics and Nigerian Languages and they treated us to great hospitality of which we are very grateful. Permit me to say that we were quite impressed with what we saw. We saw teams of academics committed to their work and delivering the programmes effectively. We saw young people – students – who were enthusiastic and who are very happy to be students of this University, and to be in their various programmes and we actually interacted with quite a number of them and we got that impression across the board and so we were very happy with what we saw…”

On his part, Prof. Ibikunle Tijani, who stood in for the leader of the accreditation panel for the History and International Studies programme, expressed delight with Unilorin’s compliance with ICT, describing it as the “most outstanding accomplishment on this campus.”

Prof. Tijani, who came from Adeleke University, Ede, Osun State, said, “We are quite impressed by what we have seen in terms of the University’s support for the Faculty and for the programme, that is, History and International Studies in particular; there is that genuine support ….” He noted further that “it is rare to have a Department, particularly of History, given the jettisoning of History in this nation, with so many Ph.D holders.”

Presenting his team’s report, the leader of the Accreditation Panel for the Christian Religious Studies and the Comparative Religious Studies programmes, Prof. Christopher Oshun from the Lagos State University, noted that “students’ enrolments in the last three sessions meet the stipulated admission requirements”.

He added that “it is evident that the staff are well-qualified in both their teaching and research, …staff development programme is on ground and most academic staff have evidently benefitted from it  either through Ph.D training or conference attendance ”

On her part, the leader of the Accreditation Panel for the Home Economics programme, Prof. Ngozi Nnam from the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, said, “We have interacted with the students and staff; our observation is that they all worked very hard to put things in place for the accreditation. There was a very high spirit and level of esprit de corps in the Department; cooperation and everybody working hard to package the Department for the accreditation …but we should not relax.”

In his own report, the leader of the Accreditation Panel for the B.Sc. Agric programme, Prof. G. N. Akpa from Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, noted that Unilorin has “a very welcoming and hospitable environment”. He expressed the belief that this has added to the productivity of the system, saying, “Anybody that drives into this place, enters into this campus will really know that you are in a University environment and we want to say that the University should keep it up. We have looked at the B. Agric programme of your University and we would say that overall the programme and the University are doing very well.”

Prof. Akpa further stated that “the curriculum for the programme is also of standard…there is a well-articulated academic regulation for the programme…because we took our time; we interacted with students and the staff, and the students were well aware of these regulations and from the sampling we got from documents and things like that, the regulation is being implemented to the letter. We evaluated the courses and we found that the system of evaluation is good.”

The Chairman of the Accreditation Panel for the Arabic and Islamic Studies programmes, Prof. Jaafar M. Kaura, in his report, explained that the Library was the panel members’ first port of call in carrying out their assessment.

Prof. Kaura said, “We were very impressed because I have seen the report of the former accreditation team and one of the areas was deficiency discovered in the area of library but we think now that the deficiency has been ameliorated.”

He added that the team was also able to access some e-resources from the e-library to confirm the claims made by the Library officials.

In his response to the various panel leaders’ separate observations, the Vice-Chancellor of the University and Chairman of the Association of West African Universities (AWAU), Prof. AbdulGaniyu Ambali (OON), said that the University accords a high priority to quality assurance and maintenance of standards of academic programmes in the institution.

Prof. Ambali noted that accreditation was a useful tool for maintaining quality assurance and quality control, adding, “It is to maintain and ensure that standards by the NUC are being maintained and even being improved upon”.

The Vice-Chancellor explained that accreditation is “also to ensure that universities keep in touch with best practices across the globe and this is why in this University, we give priority to accreditation and quality assurance. We are very sure of your thoroughness because of the calibre of academic giants here today and we are also assured of your fairness in the assessment of our efforts.”

Appreciating the accreditation teams for coming, the Vice-Chancellor added that “we are looking forward to your objective and friendly assessment of our efforts.”

Joining the Vice-Chancellor to receive the accreditation team were the Registrar, represented by the Deputy Registrar, Mr M.S. Adegoke; the University Librarian, Dr. Joseph Omoniyi; representative of the Bursar, Mr. Munir Dere; the Director, Academic of Planning, Prof. O.A. Omotesho; Deans of Faculties and Heads of the respective academic Departments.

Meanwhile, the Vice-Chancellor has also received members of the Quantity Surveyors Registration Board of Nigeria who were on the campus for the assessment and professional accreditation of the Quantity Surveying programme in the University.

The leader of the Accreditation Team, Prof. (Mrs.) Olubola Babalola, said that in line with the mandate of the regulatory body, the team was in the University to ensure that Quantity Surveying graduates produced by the institution meet the requisite standards. She said the team was also in the University to ensure that the students are being taught not only the theoretical aspects but also the practical aspects of the profession.

    In her remarks, the Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Academic), Prof. (Mrs.) Ijaiya, who stood in for the Vice-Chancellor, noted that the University of Ilorin was contributing its quota to the development of the Quantity Surveying profession