The National University Commission, NUC, has granted permission for the London Academy of Business School in partnership with the University of Sunderland in the United Kingdom to operate in Nigeria.
Following the approval, the first academic session is
expected to kick off in January 2024 at the Public Service Institute of
Nigeria, Abuja.
The delegation from the University of Sunderland led by Dr.
Derek Watson, an Associate Professor from the faculty of business law and
tourism has assured that students in Nigeria will have the same academic
standards as their counterparts in the UK, while the management at the same
time promised to respect the environment and guidelines from the NUC.
Speaking to journalists after meeting with the Executive
Secretary of NUC, Dr. Watson said, “The meeting with the Executive Secretary
was very productive, the University of Sunderland has over 30 years of
experience.
“We were the first UK university to market. What we have
agreed on today is the criticality of following the compliance procedures. In
addition to that, we would source credible academics to deliver our programmes
from LABs who are qualified teachers and also practicing consultants. The
student will get the same experience as those students studying in England.”
Corroborating Watson’s views, the President/Director of
Studies, at the London Academy of Business School, LABS, Dr. Larry Jones-Esan,
explained that the visit to NUC was to get the operational license to establish
in Nigeria.
According to him, “The meeting with the NUC today is for us
to get the recognition that we are allowed to run the Sunderland courses in
Nigeria so, we do not need the NUC accreditation, what we need is recognition,
that is very important because if we run any courses in Nigeria without them
recognizing it, that degree is useless and they cannot do NYSC, so we do not
want that to be the case.
“So for us to do that, we have to get their permission first
before we go out their and start recruiting students otherwise we will be
shooting ourselves in the foot. If they come here and say you are doing
something illegal, you will pay fine and before you get out of that it will be
too much.
“So what we have done is that we bring those people in and
come in myself as the CEO of the London Academy Business School, make sure that
we have them aware of what we are doing.
“Today is a very important day for the London Business
School in partnership with the University of Sunderland. We met with the
Executive Secretary of the National University Commission and discussions went
as planned, making sure that we do things right.
“One thing that came out very clear is that they want people
to work with them but work in a way that they respect the authority and respect
the system and the environment.
“So we are going to make sure that everything we do follows
the guidelines. We have very beautiful guidelines but if you fail to follow
them you might run into trouble. If two million people apply for university
admissions every year in Nigeria and only 700 hundred thousand are getting a place,
that is a problem and that is a challenge they want to solve that problem and
we think we have come at the right time.
“We thank the delegates from the University of Sunderland
working with the London Academy of Business School in making sure that this
gives results as quickly as possible.”
Asked whether the NUC granted a license to them, he said,
“This is the reason why we are here, we have gotten the license, that is
recognition to run this process, that will be done within a week, and we are
hopeful this will be done shortly. We will start running the university from
January 2024.”
Earlier, the team visited the Public Service Institute of
Nigeria along Kubwa Road Abuja which is going to serve as the study center and
they were received by the Administrator and CEO of the institute, Abdul-Ganiyu
Obatayinbo.
The Administrator said the environment was far better than
what the University of Sunderland has in the UK, adding that the institute is
saddled with the responsibility of building the capacity of public/civil
servants.
He said that the institute has a 500-seat auditorium, 12
different halls of 30 seater capacity each, hostels with 202 bedrooms, a
hospital, security quarters, a sports complex, entrepreneurship center among
other facilities that would make teaching and learning conducive.
Some of the courses to be offered at the undergraduate level
include, computer science, business and management, and network system engineering
among others, while business administration, international business management,
and education leadership among others will be offered at the masters level.
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