UNN graduates 11,500 as 94 bags first class

Ninety-four First Class honours recipients are among 11, 496 graduates to be awarded first and higher degrees as the University of Nigeria, Nsukka (UNN) marks its 41st convocation on January 27 and 28, 2012.
UNN Vice Chancellor, Professor Bartho Okolo, disclosed on Monday at a pre-convocation press briefing that the graduating class was 10 per cent higher than that of the previous year.
Ten per cent (1,253) of the graduands would receive higher degrees, including 170 doctorate degrees.
Okolo said the number of postgraduate students continued to increase in line with the university’s renewed emphasis on training of higher level manpower.
He disclosed that a highlight of the convocation ceremony would be the convocation lecture to be delivered by former president, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, on Thursday, January 26.
Obasanjo would speak on education and national development.
The convocation lecture would be preceded by a public lecture. The guest lecturer, Dr Josef Shevel, President of Galilee International Management Institute, Nahalal, Israel would speak on “economic development based on education and higher education: The case of Israel.”
The vice chancellor further said that as part of the university’s manpower development programme and policy of recruiting high calibre staff to replace the ageing ones, UNN had offered automatic employment to 40 First Class Honours graduates.