- The Vice-Chancellor of Augustine University, Epe, Lagos State, Professor Steve Afolami, has said private universities should not lower their benchmarks in their bid to attract students, saying the consequences are dire for the society.
The Vice-Chancellor of Augustine University, Epe, Lagos State, Professor Steve Afolami, has said private universities should not lower their benchmarks in their bid to attract students, saying the consequences are dire for the society.
He stated this while speaking on the coming maiden graduation of the school.
This is just as he lauded the National Universities Commission, NUC, for its flexibility in approving courses to be run by universities in the country.
Afolami said though 54 students were admitted as pioneer students of the university, only 32 would graduate because the institution had to prune those who could not cope.
“The fact that they paid fees is not a guarantee that they must be pushed through the system when they could not cope. In fact, they have to pay adequate attention to their studies.
Also, the Senate instituted competition among them. Those on 4.5 CGPA are entitled to N100,000 tuition scholarship yearly. If a student maintains that for four years, he enjoys it.
“Students next to that level are on N50,000 scholarship yearly. We have very appropriate lecturers to students ratio and we give the best of attention to our students,” he said.
Afolami said tuition fee would have been higher if not that the owners, Catholic Church, Lagos Archdiocese give it monthly subvention.
The VC said new courses would be introduced after approval by the NUC. He listed some of the courses to include Cybersecurity, Software Engineering and Information Technology, Mass Communication, among others.
Afolami said it was good that the NUC was now collaborating with universities to run courses that would be appropriate to current demands in the market.
He said the university had an endowment of N40 million from the estate of Mrs Abimbola Aina Mulele on agriculture and horticulture.
He disclosed that his the university had gone into working agreements with some universities in the US and Britain in some areas.
He commended the Catholic Church and other philanthropists for supporting the institution.
