By John Sheka Tarawalie
Management of the University of Sierra Leone (USL) on Tuesday 22nd June 2021 held a press conference at Fourah Bay College to inform the press and the general public about the university interventions to re-engineer strategic academic and administrative processes to improve the performance of the university.
The re-engineering initiative is an outcome of consultative deliberations with senior administrative and academic staff on a wide range of quality issues aimed at raising standards in key aspects of the University’s operations.
In his statement, Prof. Foday Sahr, Vice-Chancellor and Principal of the University of Sierra Leone highlighted the re-engineering drive, which is: to develop a framework that will ensure that USL produced competent and qualified graduates to meet national and global needs, to consolidate and promote intellectual development through effective University governance and faculty administration which will produce the desired impact on research, teaching and community service and to map out strategies for resource mobilization for the re-engineering initiatives and their implementations.
Prof. Foday Sahr revealed that currently, the university administration is implementing several initiatives which are all geared towards ensuring quality. He added that these include, Quality Management Training in partnership with UNIDO, Consolidation of staff database, Mandatory Pedagogical Training of all staff of the University, Review of Curricula for all programmes, Harmonization of assessment and examination procedures and Academic staff workload audit.
He informed his audience that a retreat was held in Bo City from 28th April to 1st May 2021 on the theme: Re-engineering of the University of Sierra Leone. He said the reasons for the retreat were to highlight the need to respond to the growing desires by the University Management Team to consult with senior administrative and academic staff on a wide range of quality issues, articulate a strategic action to raise standards in key aspects of the university operations, bringing together Heads of Campuses, all Deans and representative Heads of Departments and Administrative Managers to explore solutions to quality issues that have been identified over the years.
He added that the retreat made key recommendations that have been considered and approved by the University Senate, noting that they have set up project groups to implement the various themes\objectives in a period of 12 months.
He further said that theme one is: The Harmonization of admissions and assessment processes including exit verification and promotion criteria. In this theme, he explained that they have reviewed the University of Sierra Leone’s admission/entry requirements and have also harmonized the student’s promotion criteria and exams’ verification processes.
Theme two he said is Centralized Coordination of Extramural Courses with the setting up of an Institute of Extramural Studies (Community College). He said this one is to focus on certificate and diploma programmes for the benefit of candidates who could not get the normal university/departmental entry requirement to train in areas that will provide them with skills for employment and subsequent university admissions.
Theme three he said is Splitting, Merging and Creation of new Faculties/Departments. He said this is to ensure more effective management of programmes, staff and other resources and ensure better workload balance for the Deans and HoDs, review existing programmes/courses, and identify new ones that are more aligned with industry expectations, government development goals and international standards.
DVC and Principal Foday Sahr revealed the new faculties: at IPAM, the Faculty of Management Sciences which will be split into 3 faculties; 1. Faculty of Accounting and Financial Services, 2. Faculty of Leadership and Governance 3. Faculty of Business Intelligence and Entrepreneurship.
At FBC, the Faculty of Social Sciences and Law will be split into 2 faculties; 1. Faculty of Law 2. Faculty of Economic and Development Studies.
At FBC also, the Faculty of Arts will be split into 2. 1. Faculty of Communication, Media and Information Studies 2. Faculty of Arts.
Theme four he said is Building an e-Learning Infrastructure, Developing e-Learning Resources and Training of Lecturers aimed at launching online Masters Courses and expanding the USL’s distance learning offers.
Theme five he said is the Review of Administrative Functions.
