By Chuka Nnabuife
Peter University will hold its maiden matriculation ceremony on Friday, April 19.
His Eminence, Peter Cardinal Okpaleke will be the chief host of the event which is expected to have Catholic bishops of Awka; Nnewi respectively in attendance, along with governors, prominent academic scholars, frontline government personalities, political leaders and captains of industry in the South East in attendance.
Over two hundred fresh students of the varsity will be inducted in the occasion which will be a historical first of the citadel located in Achina and Onne towns of Aguata and Orumba local councils respectively, in Anambra State.
The institution which has undergone full resource verification and had its courses approved by the National University Commission (NUC) and all requisite agencies runs as a robust academic citadel with quintessential Catholic values of sound scholarship and deep moral ethos. It also exposes its students to vital orientations on leadership as well as occasional professional conferences and seminars that also attract the participation of practitioners.
With four faculties, 12 departments and 24 programs spanning through the humanities; social and management sciences; science and computing technologies; health and allied sciences; and Law (still waiting for the visit of the Council of Legal Education), the university, since it’s commencement of academic studies, earlier has shown its keenness to produce brilliant, bold and focused graduates who will contribute, remarkably in solving Nigeria’s and Africa’s problems.
The Vice Chancellor of the university, Rev. Fr. (Prof) Chukwuemenam Emmanuel Umezinwa, explains that the goal of the school is to give birth to a new generation of Nigerian youths who are distinguished by their high knowledge, exceptional sense of social responsibility and zeal for productivity. He added that the varsity has a very high interest in producing graduates with solid digital orientation. Hence information sciences, IT, artificial intelligence and new streams of information technologies are embedded constant factors in all courses of the school.
A versatile academic himself and previously the Special Assistant to the Vice-chancellor of Nnamdi Azikiwe University on Academic Matters before his current appointment, Fr. Umezinwa has a very exciting vision of a university that will bridge the gap between gown and town. The speed with which this vision is pursued is even the most amazing. Peter University, in so short a time, has become the first institution that has completed full laying of fiber optics cable for Internet access with a 35 metre mast and a state-of-the-art data centre already in place. The school is equally deploying the very current Learning Management Systems (LMS) for accessing lectures from any part of the world.
