A visiting Professor at the Department of Educational Foundations, Prof. Joshua Adebisi Omotosho, has called on teachers to use songs as part of their pedagogy. According to him, songs have unique qualities which make content stick in the brain more than other form of delivery and therefore asked for the conversion of critical areas of learning into songs for easy recollection. Using himself as an example, he said he tried to unravel the mystery behind why songs, learned more than 55 years ago, were still vividly remembered with relative ease. Consequently, he sang and danced to songs (in Twi) he learnt about five-and-a-half decades ago to illustrate this point. The visiting don was speaking at an Occasional Lecture at the SMS Auditorium on the theme “That Songs are the Most Enduring Memoirs of My Childhood has Implications for Counselling, Research and Some Feeding Habits.” Professor Omototsho,who left Ghana in his youthful days in December 1961 to Nigeria and resurfaced in Ghana in 1996, effortlessly sang some of the songs he learnt at Apinamang in the Eastern Region during his elementary school days, which included “Teacher pon yɛn tɛn”, “Anoma ketewa”, “Apinamang mmofra”, “influenza yɛ yadeɛ bone”, “Yesu medefo”, amongst others. The Guidance and Counselling Professor also did a rendition of the seven steps in counselling, which he has personally composed, and urged counsellors to employ such methods in the discharge of their duties. He commended Ghanaians for their commitment to fight the destruction of the environment and water bodies as a result of the devasting effects of illegal mining (popularly known as “galamsey”). The visiting lecturer said the pollution of rivers in Ghana had affected the quality of the rivers, including River Subrane, which according to him was the cleanest river in Ghana in the 60s. He commended Ghana for its academic promotion methods, dissemination of information through Public Address System, healthy national debates, speed ramps and the cost-effective traditional mourning clothes. He suggested to the University to embark upon an interdisciplinary research into “Asoa”, a local fruit, adding that “Asoa” has good medicinal benefits. Professor Omototsho advised Ghanaians to stay away from starchy foods, food enhancers, fast foods and urged them to eat healthy foods like cocoyam and plantain. In his remarks, the Vice-Chancellor, Prof. Joseph Ghartey Ampiah, said the occasional lecture series was open to all faculty members to share their experiences with their colleagues in the University. He said through pedagogy and learning, “we can use songs to remember things and put them in our long term memory and it will be there forever.” He said most of the times when we learn and put them in our short term memory, it vanishes within a twinkling of an eye. He, therefore, lauded Prof. Omotosho for advocating the use of songs as a means of impacting. The Pro-Vice-Chancellor, Prof. K.T. Oduro; the Registrar, Mr. John Kofi Nyan, and some childhood friends of Prof. Omotosho during his elementary school days at Apinamang were part of the audience.  

The Director of Academic Planning and Quality Assurance (DAPQA), Prof. Kofi Awusabo-Asare, was one of the scholars invited by the Vatican to speak at the 50th Anniversary of Populorum Progressio held in Rome, Italy. The conference, which was organised by the Holy See from 3rd to 5th April, 2017, was on the theme, “Perspectives for Promoting Integral Human Development: 50 years from the Encyclical Letter Populorum Progressio” His Holiness, Pope Francis has created a new Dicastery for Promoting Integral Human Development, which providentially coincides with the 50th Anniversary of the Encyclical Letter Populorum Progressio (26th March 1967), an Encyclical which outlined the Church’s vision of the human person. Prof. Awusabo-Asare was invited to present a paper on the “Role of the Migratory Family in Integral Human Development” at the Third Session which was under the sub-theme “Man-Woman”. His presentation focused on the role of the migratory family within the context of integral human development, as well as some of the possible responses from the Church and humanity. The Holy Father welcomed members to the Conference on 4th April, 2017 and thereafter had audience with each of the Cardinals, Bishops and presenters. Thus, Prof. Awusabo-Asare had the opportunity to interact with the Pope.

A Senior Programmes Officer of Nuffic, Mrs. Marieke Nieuwendijk, has commended UCC’s commitment towards promoting Water and Sanitation as an academic programme in the University. She lauded the University for implementing new teaching methods, developing new curricula and embarking on staff development to strengthen the University’s capacity to offer professional training in the area of Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH). Mrs. Nieuwendijk gave this commendation when she called on the Vice-Chancellor, Prof. Joseph Ghartey, at his office as part of her working visit to Ghana to assess the implementation of various projects that are being supported by Nuffic in UCC and other Ghanaian academic institutions in line with the organisation’s vision of internationalizing education. The Water and Sanitation Unit of the Department of Chemistry was awarded a grant by Nuffic to strengthen the capacity of the Unit to provide professional development support for Environmental Health and Sanitation Experts in the Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assemblies (MMDAs) in 2014. The Unit is being supported by the Maastricht University of the Netherlands to implement the project. With a budget of €919, 039, UCC is expected to develop the Water and Sanitation Unit into a full-fledged Department to offer sustainable expertise, services and training to the Ministry of Local Government and Rural Development and other clients, as well as provide support to the MMDAs in the Monitoring and Evaluation of WASH services. The Former Provost of the College of Agriculture and Natural Sciences, Prof. Samuel Yeboah Mensah, who is the Director of the Project on campus, noted that the Water and Sanitation Unit has made significant strides towards the implementation of the project. He noted that Water and Sanitation has become key to the development of Ghana and, therefore, called on the University to take advantage of the national and international attention that is being paid to this area of social development to enhance the development of the subject area in the University. He appealed to the University management to support the School of Physical Sciences to establish the Department of Water and Sanitation in the University. The Vice-Chancellor, Prof. Joseph Ghartey Ampiah, for his part, said that the University was happy to partner Nuffic in the area of Water and Sanitation and gave the assurance that the University would do everything that it could to support the project. He said management would support the School and the College to establish the Department of Water and Sanitation and ensure the success of the project, which will end in 2018. He said even though the University currently has a challenge with office space, additional space would be created that after the completion of the Science Annex Block, adding that the Department of Water and Sanitation, when established, would get offices in the Block. Accompanying Mrs. Marieke Nieuwendijk were the Provost of the College of Agriculture and Natural Sciences, Prof. L. K. Sam-Amoah, the Dean of the School of Physical Sciences, Prof. Kofi Essuman and the Coordinator of the Water and Sanitation Unit, Dr. Peter Appiah Obeng. In an interview with Dr. Peter Appiah Obeng, who doubles as the Project Coordinator, he shed more light on the specific interventions being implemented by the Unit to achieve the goal of the project. These include the offer of scholarships for four lecturers of the Unit to pursue their PhD studies in Maastricht University, as well as three former teaching assistants to pursue their Masters and return to support the future Department of Water and Sanitation. Dr. Obeng also indicated that physical facilities including laboratory and office equipment worth two hundred thousand euros (€200,000) are being procured as part of the capacity building. According to Dr. Obeng, the project is supporting the Unit to review its existing curricula and to introduce additional relevant programmes in close collaboration with industry and other stakeholders of the WASH sector to respond to the perennial and emerging water and sanitation needs and challenges of the nation. Dr. Obeng said that, with monitoring and evaluation and gender issues having been recognised as key challenges in the WASH sector, the project has a specific component aimed at developing a short course in gender-sensitive monitoring and evaluation of WASH to be run by the future Department after piloting it in five selected MMDAs under the project. He also noted that the Centre for Gender Research Advocacy and Documentation (CEGRAD) of UCC is supporting the Unit in promoting gender equality among staff and students, as well as integrating it into the curricula being developed by the Unit.