Develop programmes to meet societal needs -Universities urged
The interim Provost of the College of Humanities and Legal Studies of the University of Cape Coast (UCC), Professor Stephen Kendie, has stressed the need for universities to develop programmes to meet the needs of society.
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That, he noted, would prevent the universities from being regarded as ‘Ivory Towers’ whose activities and products do not contribute significantly to addressing challenges in society.
Prof. Kendie made these statements in his office when he granted an exclusive interview to the Daily Graphic on his vision and plan for the College of Humanities and Legal Studies of which he is the interim provost.
College of UCC
The College, which comprises the Faculty of Arts, School of Business, Faculty of Law and the Faculty of Social Sciences, is part of four other colleges under the new system of administration adopted by the UCC in August this year.
The other colleges of the university are College of Education Studies, College of Agricultural and Natural Sciences, College of Health and Allied Sciences and the College of Distance Education.
Prof. Kendie said his immediate plan was to review the curriculum of the college from being lecturer-centred to student-centred.
Student-centred curriculum
He explained that with a student-centered curriculum, students would no longer depend solely on lecturers for information or knowledge about the courses that they offered at the college but would be guided by their lecturers to search for information on their own for the mutual benefit of both lecturers and students.
Explaining the need for the review, Prof. Kendie, who, prior to his appointment as provost, was the Dean of the Faculty of Social Sciences, said the existing method of giving knowledge to students did not allow many students to develop critical minds and innovative ways of solving problems. He added that the situation was partially responsible for the increasing graduate unemployment in the country.
“Many students under the present method of teaching still believe in memorising lecture notes and reproducing them in examinations and this practice does not help them as people who are supposed to be equipped with knowledge and skills after their university education to solve societal problems,” he stated.
As part of the student-centred curriculum, Prof. Kendie said the college would adopt the problem-based learning approach where students would be given a particular problem in their respective courses of study and guided by their lecturer to find a solution to that problem.
He said the School of Business, for instance, had a lot of accountancy students who wanted avenues to practise the knowledge gained in the lecture halls.
“Such students can be attached to some of the market women at the Kotokraba Market here in Cape Coast who want assistance to organise their trading accounts. By so doing, the students would gain practical experience of what they are taught in the lecture halls and at the same time help to grow the businesses of these market women for them to create wealth and employ more people,” he added.
He said if students were taught through the student-centered approach, it would make them respond spontaneously to challenges and problems in society as they would have acquired the needed knowledge and nous or practical intelligence to deal with such situations.
Practical component teaching
Prof. Kendie also stressed the need for lecturers in the college to deepen the practical component of their teaching by obtaining practical experiences through their research.
He said under his administration, graduate students would be encouraged to adopt a more practical way of conducting their researches by going into communities to engage with stakeholders and come out with practical solutions to address some of the problems they might have identified in those communities.
He proposed to have an annual research report that comprises the research findings of all lecturers in the college from which he would select the most relevant findings and advise the government and other stakeholders on policy formulation and implementation in the country through policy briefs.