We Will Continue Encouraging Spirit Of Excellence In Teaching—Owo Poly Rector

By Niyi Olutunde, Akure

The Rector of Rufus Giwa Polytechnic, Owo, Mr Gani Ogundahunsi has said the institution will continue to encourage the spirit of excellence in teaching, research, scholarship and creative activities among staff and students.

Ogundahunsi gave the assurance on Wednesday while speaking with journalists at Owo.

According to him, the state-owned tertiary institution has experienced tremendous progress in line with the dreams of the Visitor of the institution who gave the Council a mandate to retool, reposition and re-engineer the institution.

His words, “My vision is to meet the mandate of the school in training high quality professional and technical manpower necessary for the rapid economic and technological transformation of the state in particular and Nigeria as a whole.

On the staff school, the Rector said “the previous management made efforts to address the problem of the school but it could not come up with solution. I wouldn’t know whether it was the lack of courage.”

“But when I came on board, the council told me that the school must be privatized and that pronouncement is a law and in doing this I put on human face I had to quickly run back to the council that this could not be possible. In which I had to seek the council’s approval that there is the need for restructuring and I started doing something.

“When we restructured the school, I thought of so many things that we could do, I made so many efforts by following the directives of the council which led to the termination of the appointments of some workers .And the government in her magnanimity decided to reabsorb them into the civil service.

“So whoever has not gone to the office of Establishment in the state to register and be reabsorbed into the government civil service will lose that opportunity. So the best thing we can do is to reposition and rebrand the institution.

“I came on board Sept 18, 2018 as Acting Rector before I became substantive Rector on October 8, 2019 and to the Glory of God we have been able to maintain peace and we have done so much within the last one year. When I came in, 32 programmes were fully accredited.

“We have been able to regularize our academics calendar, we have been able to renovate and put into shape our ICT centre, we have HUAWEI ICT academy centre, to train both staff and students on computer networking. We have been able to bring into completion many abandoned projects”.

Ogundahunsi also disclosed that the institution is now working in tandem with a notable university to start degree programmes saying that this would eliminated the problem of no enrollment.

Speaking on the welfarism of the workforce, the Rector said, “we don’t joke with the welfare of our staff, and I have to commend them for their support and understanding”.

While reiterating his readiness to deal with anybody who goes against the institution’s rules on selling handout to students, the Rector said, “in this school, discipline is the key. No selling of handout, if any one is caught selling handout, such will face disciplinary action. We are to mentor and monitor students not to torment them”.