On March 9, the Vice President for Academic Affairs & Provost, Prof. Muhammadou Kah, inaugurated the Graduate School Advisory and Doctoral Dissertation Boards.
The Graduate Advisory Board to be chaired Prof Kah has the following members: Associate Professor & Dean of the School of IT & Computing, Dr. Mathias Fonkam; Associate Professor & HoD/Chair, School of IT & Computing, Dr. Olumide Longe; Associate Professor & Director of Graduate Programs, School of IT & Computing/School of Engineering, Dr. Behrouz Aslani; Professor & Dean, School of Business & Entrepreneurship, Dr. Attahir Yusuf; Associate Professor & HoD/Chair/Director of Graduate Programs, School of Business & Entrepreneurship, Dr. (Mrs.) Jainaba Kah; Assistant Professor & HoD/Chair of Department, School of Business & Entrepreneurship, Dr. Narasimha Rao Vajjhala; Assistant Professor & HoD/Chair of Department, School of Business & Entrepreneurship, Dr. Abiodun Sherifat Isiaka; Professor & Interim Dean, School of Graduate Studies, Dr. Chris Mbah; Professor & HoD/Chair of Department, School of Arts & Sciences, Dr. Ritchard M'Bayo, Associate Professor & Director of Academic Planning & Quality Assurance in the Provost's Office, Dr. Samuel Tesunbi, and Professor & Interim Dean, School of Law, Peter Ocheme.
The Provost also announced that two advanced graduate students will be nominated to join the 12-member board as graduate students' representatives; one will be a Master's degree candidate and the other a doctoral candidate. Each of the students must have passed their proposal defense.
"We wanted to convey to you some of the continuous improvements that we have been putting in place to ensure that we have a high-quality graduate school," remarked the Provost at the inauguration.
"We have been working diligently to ensure that the existing policies have been refined, and continuously improved and aligned and benchmarked to the best standards out there."
The Provost also inaugurated the Doctoral Dissertation Board which he also chairs.
The following are members: Associate Professor & Dean of the School of IT & Computing, Dr. Mathias Fonkam, Associate Professor & Interim Dean of the School of Arts & Sciences, Patrick Fay; Professor & Dean, School of Business & Entrepreneurship, Dr. Attahir Yusuf; Professor & Interim Dean, School of Graduate Studies, Dr. Chris Mbah; Professor & Interim Dean, School of Law; Dr. Peter Abo Ocheme; Professor, School of Law, Dr. Ahmadu Lawal; Professor & HoD/Chair of Department, School of Arts & Sciences, Dr. Ritchard M'Bayo; Professor of Marketing, School of Business & Entrepreneurship, Dr. Linus Osuagwu; Associate professor & HoD/Chair of Department, School of IT & Computing, Olumide Longe; Associate Professor & Director of Graduate Programs, School of Business & Entrepreneurship, Dr. (Mrs.) Jainaba Kah; Associate Professor & Director of Graduate Programs, School of IT & Computing/School of Engineering, Behrouz Aslani; and Associate Professor & Director of Academic Planning & Quality Assurance in the Provost's Office and School of Arts & Sciences, Dr. Samuel Tesunbi.
"This becomes particularly significant and important," announced the Provost at the board launch, "given the fact that the AUN Ph.D. program is maturing, and is expecting to have students fulfilling the established requirements [soon] for attaining a Ph.D. degree."
The provost then explained the focus and commitment of the board as "ensuring that Ph.D. earned in our respective schools and programs are of the highest quality and standards."
He said AUN would ensure that it is of equal standing with top universities in terms of the program structure, learning experience, research requirements, originality of research, minimum publication required, peer-reviewed international journals, and conferences and mentorship and supervision of the Ph.D. students.
Besides internal mechanisms at the graduate school level at the supervision level, "we felt that there should be a governance of the dissertation itself to a transparent mechanism and the board that will vet the activities that will lead to the completion of the dissertation after it is validated or cleared by the main supervisor of the thesis."
He then went further to describe the procedures of operation of the board that includes details of the thesis supervision and defense. Requirements and procedures for examination and results collation were among the talking points at the inauguration.
"And that is the reason we insist that supervision must be done properly. That students must be subjected to peer-reviewed publications out there, it does not mean they will not publish in national and regional journals. But our minimum to release any thesis examination and viva?? is what we have articulated."
Reported by Omorogbe Omorogiuwa