Media urged to forge closer ties with Universities

Accra, June 15, GNA 96 The University of Ghana has arranged with a number of private developers to build hostels, to accommodate about 8,000 students over the next three years.

Prof Kwesi Yankah, Pro Vice-Chancellor of the University, who announced this, said the University had a capacity to accommodate only 40 per cent of students admitted each year in the five traditional halls located on the main campus of the University. Prof Yankah said student intake for the next academic year had been reduced by 19 per cent to improve the student-lecturer ratio in the University.

The Pro-Vice Chancellor was speaking in Accra at a reception to brief journalists on the governance structures of the University of Ghana, Legon on Wednesday.

Professor Clifford Nii Boi Tagoe, Acting Vice-Chancellor of the University of Ghana, urged the media to strengthen relations with the country=92s universities to move the nation forward. He said it was necessary for media practitioners to understand the structures, powers and responsibilities of governance in the universities to ensure that stories passed on to the public helped to maintain a healthy corporate and academic image for the universities. In an address on the governing structure of the University of Ghana, Professor Henrietta Mensa-Bonsu, Vice-Dean, Faculty of Law, said the University had a two-tier governance structure, which reposed power in two hierarchically-arranged institutions with different spheres of influence namely the Academic Board and the University Council. She said the composition of the University Council, which had Law-making, administrative and oversight responsibilities, spanned the social spectrum and included representation from second cycle schools, industry and the Government.

She said the Academic Board, chaired by the Vice-Chancellor, was the supreme authority on purely academic matters and had standing committees including those for the discipline of Senior Members; Senior and Junior Staff as well as Junior Members of the University. Prof Mensah-Bonsu said under the current administrative structure, the University of Ghana is to have two Pro-Vice-Chancellors, who would run a two-year renewable term.