Ekiti State University - THAT THE GOOD LEGACY MAY BE SUSTAINED Being the paper presented by His Excellency Dr. Kayode Fayemi Governor, Ekiti State, Nigeria as Visitor to the Ekiti State University (EKSU) on the Occasion of the 18th Convocation Ceremony o

Started by EKSUAdoEkiti, Apr 15, 2013, 01:31 AM

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THAT THE GOOD LEGACY MAY BE SUSTAINED

Being the paper presented by His Excellency Dr. Kayode Fayemi Governor, Ekiti State, Nigeria as Visitor to the Ekiti State University (EKSU) on the Occasion of the 18th Convocation Ceremony of the University. Thursday, April 4, 2013

Protocols

It gives me great pleasure to speak to this august audience.

I would like to start by welcoming the representative of my dear brother and friend, His Excellency Dr. John Dramani Mahama, President of the Republic of Ghana. I thank you most heartily for accepting our invitation to give the convocation lecture this year. I cordially welcome you and the rest of the delegation to the land of honour, Ekiti State, Nigeria.

I, and indeed, the entire Ekiti State University community, as well as the Honourable people of Ekiti State, Nigeria, are proud to be associated with the achievements of President Mahama, which have been validated by the good people of the Republic of Ghana, who voted for him overwhelming in an election that has become a model for peaceful democratic transitions in Africa.

I applaud the graduands who have worked hard over the last few years to earn degrees from the various faculties and colleges of this renowned citadel of learning. I rejoice with you all and your families, on this great landmark in your lives, and wish you God's speed in your future endeavors.

Convocations hold a significant place in the life of any society. On the one hand, it signals the end of a period of tutelage for those graduating; a celebration of their successful conclusion of the rights of passage into the cadre of society's elite. On the other hand, and more importantly it is that time when people congregate from near and far, to celebrate the role of the university in the society.

This occasion provides us with an auspicious opportunity to reflect upon the role of the University in our society. Our reflection will be quickened even more by the realization that, as many have consistently argued, and I agree, the challenge of economic recovery is inextricably linked with the restoration of values; the reinstallation of ethnics at the centre public life that in turn revitalizes every other province of our national enterprise. Education is the means to both ends and since higher institutions constitute the apex of formal training that we undergo as adults, an interrogation of the university's calling to the wider society is all the more pertinent.

The university does have a mission to the wider society. It is not a place where intellectuals are caught up in rarefied abstractions isolated from the mundane practicalities of everyday life. It is a socially embedded enclave of scholars. In fact, the university's ultimate worth may be measured in how relevant its contributions are to social life. At every stage of a society's development, problems peculiar to that stage are bound to manifest. The task of addressing such challenges rests uniquely on the university as the place where society's problem-solvers are groomed. Ever since the first Studia Generalia in Paris, France and Bologna, Italy drew students from across medieval Europe to study law, theology, philosophy and medicine, disciplines that even then extended beyond nations and across borders; universities have been seen as havens of learning and places where the frontiers of human understanding can be expanded. This essential mission of the university remains.

The university is a bulwark of knowledge production and leadership development. Higher education goes beyond rote leaning; it is about engineering a certain cast of personality, instilling character and competence in the students and emphasizing not just the development of intellectual acumen but values-centered perspectives as well.

Higher education, as the very name suggests, goes beyond the impartation of academic skills to the cultivation of the virtues of – discipline, circumspection, temperance and self-mastery. The goal is to create a holistic competence that enables the scholar to function as a being that is both professionally capable and ethnically aware. After all, degrees from universities are supposed to be awarded to those who satisfy the high standards of character and learning.

This conception of education is nothing new. The sacralization of leadership roles in pre-colonial societies meant that the traditional elites – the nobles, chiefs, and title-holders were achievers; people who had demonstrated expertise and high moral aptitudes. Most of these societies were organizes along the lines of age groups and the ritual disciplines that accompanied the initiation into every age grade was based on the recognition that training for a productive life in the community had to impart both moral and occupational skills. With each initiation into subsequent age grades, this understanding was reinforced, bolstering the inner awareness of a sacred duty to one's community. Being a full adult male of female, thus, was not a function of the chrono-biological process, but signified a faithful completion of the socialization process, and the attainment of mental and moral maturity. Adulthood implied a fidelity to the rites of passage and a successful compliance with its disciplines. The richness of our culture's worldview permitted no dichotomy between the moral and the practical. All life had to live in a framework of ethnic coherence and consistency.

This is the understanding that should undergird our definition of the university and its place in the society. It is the last stage of a long term socialization process beginning from childhood that familiarizes us with our inner potential and acquaints us with our roles as constituent members of society. It equips us not only with the sense of responsibility to actualize ourselves, but also with the notion that we are social actors with a responsibility to use our endowments for the betterment of the community and good of all.

Seen through this prism, it becomes clear that the university is a leadership factory, a critical juncture in the formal process of elite selection. The term 'elitism' has come to denote a negative trait associated with the select few in society with excessive material endowment. This is far original definition which is relevant to our discourse; the term elite originally referred to those who were enlightened. Elitism today is used often in association with wealth but it was traditional anchored on knowledge. The university's role today is to restore an authentic elitism that is defined by intellectual acumen and moral integrity,

It is therefore absolutely vital that the integrity of the elite selection process mediated by the university is safe-guarded just as in times past; the process of initiation into each age Grade and titular position was jealously protected as though the sustenance of the society dependend on it – and yes, it does.

The role of the university has to be defined not only in terms of its situation within a particular locale but in the broader context of a world that is also changing and is levying steep demands upon us, not just as Nigerians but also as Africans. We find ourselves operating in the Information Age and the Knowledge Economy. The signal economic principle of the current epoch is that the most crucial factor of production is no longer land or labour or capital but knowledge. Without knowledge, it is impossible to maximally harness the other factors of production. Africa is the world's richest continent in terms of natural resources but she remains poor because she has not been able to harness her knowledge base to translate her abundant natural resource wealth into real economic advantage. The technological deficit that has prevented us, for instance, from being able to refine the crude oil buried beneath our land and transforming our country from a primary resource exporter into a manufacturing nation is a knowledge deficit. Knowledge has emerged as the most significant driver of economic growth.

As centres of learning, universities have a special mandate to solve local and global challenges, discover and maximize new knowledge and enable cultural and political understanding by creating environments that promote civil dialogue and debate.

We may think of the present world economic order as a pyramid. At the base of that pyramid are the exporters of primary products which are rich in natural resources. Many countries in Africa and the Middle East are in this class. Next in ascending order from that group are the countries that export manufactured goods and then those that export capital. At the apex of the pyramid are those that export knowledge. The United States is the biggest exporter of knowledge in the world. She accounts for 40 percent of global spending on research and development and 63 percent of the most cited publications. She is home to 30 of the world's top 40 universities and 70 percent of Nobel laureates work there. Universities have been vital enablers of America's economic primacy. Globally renowned business firms such as Google, Yahoo!, Cisco and sun Microsystems were nurtured by Stanford University. The social media phenomenon, Facebook, pioneered by Mark Zuckerberg emerged from his project while at Harvard University.

Universities cannot be seen as places where certificates are doled out to graduates after a period of time - Where young people are churned out certificated but barely educated. It is a place where practical solutions to our developmental problems are crafted. The challenge of higher learning in the knowledge economy is to bridge the gulf between town and gown; between the ivory tower and our industries and business offices; between the academy and the public square. There is a sense that the things we learn in the classroom are far removed from the realities that we will encounter in offices and board rooms. Only by locating itself at the centre of society's concerns can the university fulfill its mandate to be the fulcrum of progress and innovation.

The foregoing is what has informed the extensive reforms my administration has been making in the education sector aimed at repositioning our institutions. In July 2011, we acted decisively on the recommendations from the Education Summit held to evaluate our education system in May 2011. One of the key recommendations which we adopted was the consolidation of several legacy higher institutions into one strong and sustainable University that we can all be proud of. I must commend Ekiti State University's Governing Council, Senate, Faculty and Students, as well as all stakeholders, for working hard to justify our actions taken in the best interest of Ekiti Kete. The success of the consolidation that birthed Ekiti State University is now being celebrated and recommended to other state governments by the Nigeria Universities Commission. Our dear EKSU is moving resolutely in the direction of proper alignment with the crucial role universities are meant to play in the society as I have discussed. I am pleased to announce that pursuant of deepening the culture of constitutionalism and democracy in our society, today, Thursday, 4th April, 2013, we are laying the foundation for the establishment of an Institute of Good Governance. The institute when fully established would draw its faculty from experience scholars and practitioners alike including my humble self.

I am also delighted to announce to this distinguished audience the establishment of the Ikogosi Graduate Summer School (IGSS) programme for post-graduate student of Ekiti State, Nigeria. This is a unique platform aimed at leveraging our intellectual resources from all over the world towards enriching and expanding the training of our (post) graduate students; providing greater scholarly opportunities; train them in the process and cultures of research in a global age; deepen and expand the horizon of (post) graduate students in Nigeria; introduce graduate students to state-of the-art research and scholarship; offer assistance to (post) graduate students in Nigeria in terms of current literature and research materials; and finally, train students in the art of writing proposals (for graduate program as well a s for research funding), and how to publish in peer-reviewed journals and other scholarly outlets. I encourage those interested to apply for this unique but highly competitive programme.

Today, as we celebrate the release of yet another generation of young Nigerians from EKSU; we are not only celebrating their initiation into responsible adulthood and productive citizenship, but also celebrating the emergence of a new set of problem solvers unleashed to tacle our collective problems – let it be heard near and far, EKSU PROUDCTS ARE PROBLEM SOLVERS!, Together, we can sustain the good legacy we are building.

Once again, I congratulate all successful graduands; and I thank you Your Excellency, distinguished ladies and gentlemen for your attention.

Dr. Kayode Fayemi

Governor

 

Via: Ekiti State University