Utilise World Bank/NOUN scholarships, VC tells northern youths

Vice Chancellor of the National Open University of Nigeria (NOUN), Prof. Abdalla Uba Adamu, has charged members of the Arewa Students Forum (ASF), to join in the campaign to ensure that access to tertiary education reaches the unreached in the country.

Specifically, he wants them to convince students in the 19 northern states to take advantage of the World Bank/NOUN 1, 000 scholarship initiative, a development he said would go a long way in the forum’s drive to contribute its quota to nation building, and the realisation of the Education For All (EFA) agenda of the United Nations, and the Federal Government.

Only recently, NOUN explained that it was in talks with the World Bank over the sponsorship of indigent students across the country, who are desirous of acquiring tertiary education.

Adamu, who made the revelation at the First Distinguished Lecture Series of the university, stated that the sponsorship was necessary because it would enable some poor people to better their lot, stressing that NOUN was willing to help them as part of its mandate to educate one million people, especially those from remote places and the poor.

“World Bank is also suggesting we talk to the states and get them to provide us with their own students. The World Bank has an education facility, which the states can access. The bank is not giving any money to NOUN or the states, but when the students are offered admission, it will pay their fees,” he said on that occasion.

While playing host to members of ASF led by its president, Comrade Habib Ahmed, Adamu said the school has keyed into the EFA initiative, as management has finalised talks with the World Bank to grant scholarships to 1, 000 less privileged students from every state of the nation.

He said all that was left was for states to key into the project as the necessary machineries needed for the actualisation of the project have been put on ground, adding that the university was also targeting Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) in the society, while married women, who have stopped their education are also among the university’s priorities.

The vice chancellor, therefore charged members of the forum to ensure that they spread the good news of NOUN, and ensure that students from the 19 northern states are registered as part of the beneficiaries of the World Bank/NOUN 1, 000 scholarship initiative.

The group president in his remarks said access to education remains a major problem in the country, adding that the emergence of NOUN was a right step in the right direction.

He said the forum, which was dedicated to bringing to the attention of government, the plight of its members, in particular, and Nigerian youths, in general, was ready to take up the challenge of propagating the good news of NOUN to all nooks and crannies of the nation.