KASU To Reposition Varsity For Global Competitiveness

The management of Kaduna State University (KASU) is holding a three-day retreat to enhance the institution's global competitiveness.

The Vice-Chancellor, Prof. Abdullahi Musa, announced the retreat's goal of enabling the university to address societal issues through research at its opening at the Fifth Chukker Resort in Kaduna. 

The Teaching Excellence Initiative, which according to Musa is currently underway, aims to improve lecturers' capacity for excellent teaching and imparting knowledge for skills, global competitiveness, self-reliance, and global employability. 

The VC stated that the retreat's objective is to establish a foundation for re-engineering and repositioning the school as a leading provider of global university education. 

He further said the retreat will develop a five-year action plan outlining the university's agenda and priorities.

“This will enable us to critically analyse the current state of the university, outline the university’s vision, and identify the gaps and ways to address them.

“It will also help us find common ground for the teaching and non-teaching staff, students and alumni to have a common vision, mission, and common objectives that would take KASU to greater heights,” Musa said.

The VC stated that the retreat aligns with his vision of establishing KASU as a regional leader and global player in delivering high-quality university education. 

He emphasized that this vision is based on the university's philosophy of excellence in research, teaching, community services, and all aspects of sustainable development.

KASU should not be a mere educational institution that produces graduates but should be a leading institution of choice regionally and globally.

“Our goal is to create an environment that allows scholars to come up with solutions to societal challenges.

“However, we cannot make a positive difference, if we are not on the same page in respect to the university’s vision and mission,” he said.

The KASU Don declared that he would work with the university's management to cultivate a culture that motivates lecturers and non-teaching staff to make a positive impact in Kaduna State, Nigeria, and the world. 

He acknowledged that KASU needs reform to address challenges such as dysfunctional units and insufficient financial resources for optimal research output. 

He guaranteed that the turnaround strategy would lead to rapid and impressive progress in research productivity, teaching excellence, and financial implementation. 

The VC promised to collaborate with everyone without discrimination and emphasized that a participatory leadership approach would help identify and utilise individual and group talents for the university's greater good. 

He highlighted the need to develop a strategy that improves KASU's operations by replacing outdated methods with new work procedures.

“We must embrace new practices and methods. This way we will be making quick progress on our most aggressive strategic plans, to instil research culture, teaching excellence and improve on our communal engagements,” he added.