The management of Gregory University, Uturu, Abia State on Wednesday announced its decision to award full scholarship to the two best candidates in the just concluded 2019 UTME examination.
This is coming days after the candidates were said to be ineligible for admission into the University of Lagos which was the candidates’ (Franklin Ekene and Emmanuel Chidiebube) institution, despite their brilliant performance, as a result of their ages.
Gregory University in a release signed by its Acting Vice Chancellor, Prof. Augustine Uwakwe disclosed that the scholarships to Ekene and Chidiebube, include tuition, and hostel fees which would last throughout the duration of their tenure at Gregory University Uturu was in tandem with the visions and aspirations of the institution’s founding fathers.
Uwakwe also hinted that the institution would be providing an academic incubation programme for the gifted students to adequately prepare them for subsequent matriculation.
“Sequel to the earlier offer of scholarship by our Chancellor, Prof Gregory Ibe, to the duo of Ezenala Ekene Franklin and Igbam Emmanuel Chidiebube, for their excellent performances in the 2019 Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME), and subsequent perceived inability of Ekene to gain admission into his university of first choice because of age, management hereby makes the following pronouncements;
“That the scholarship grant announced by the Chancellor is in tandem with the vision, mission and aspirations of the founding fathers of Gregory University, Uturu and has subsequently been rectified by our management.
“That the scholarship package is comprehensive, covering the payment of the candidates’ tuition and hostel fees, throughout the duration of their tenure at Gregory University Uturu.
“That in keeping with the maxim of Gregory University Uturu, Knowledge for Tomorrow, we shall provide an academic incubation programme for the gifted students that will adequately prepare them for subsequent matriculation.
“That the candidates are free to approach our Admission Unit to commence their intake protocols and obtain guidance on how they can be absorbed into any of our highly competitive programmes, which include the following, Medicine and Health Sciences, Law, Engineering, Agriculture, Environmental Sciences, Natural and Applied Sciences, Humanities Social Sciences and Management Sciences”.
Meanwhile, stakeholders in the education sector in the state have commended the decision of the management of Gregory University to offer admission to Franklin and Chidiebube which they said was a way of promoting hard work and brilliance among students especially at a time when the education system in the country is facing great challenge.
Some of the respondents including Mr. Gilbert Nwachukwu who spoke with our reporter berated the Lagos State University for declining to offer admission to the brilliant students.
According to Nwachukwu, it was high time the Nigeria University Commission, JAMB and other stakeholders come to a roundtable to review the existing admission laws and policies to meet current global education practices.
He urged other private universities and polytechnics in the country to emulate the actions taken by Gregory University by making sure that they encouraged brilliant and gifted students regardless of their ages.
“Why do we need to be talking about age when these students wrote the same JAMB exam with their mates and those that are older than they are? What I expected JAMB or any other institution to do is to subject them to another round of test and if they come out with sterling performance, they should be given immediate admission.
“Are we saying that we should not promote brilliance again? I was a teacher and I can tell you that in course of my teaching carrier, I had students who before you even teach, they have known the answer. What we do is that when we test them on a couple of occasions and they performed well, we would promote them to the next class. Because keeping them in the same class with others will be a setback to them and not in the interest of other students and pupils.
“These students have gone ahead to become great in life and a couple of them left Nigeria for overseas to complete their studies on scholarship and that justifies our decision to move them higher than their co-students.
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“So, what Gregory University did should be commended for taking the steps that they took by giving admission to the students.”
