Oyedepo tasks parents on child upbringing

Chancellor and Chairman, Board of Regents, Covenant University, Ota, Dr. David O. Oyedepo has advised parents and guardians to instill in their wards the cultures of discipline and responsibility so that they would grow up to be responsible citizens.

Oyedepo in his address at the 17th matriculation ceremony of the university said every child is born as a raw material and appropriate training makes the child a treasure.

The chancellor who is also the founder, Living Faith Ministries posited that qualitative training is key to securing the future of our children.

While urging parents and guardians to allow CU bring out the best out of the students, the Chancellor said the university was open to enquiries from parents desirous of knowing how their wards were faring.

He affirmed that the university’s core values had proved profitable over the years and had enabled graduates of the institution to keep scaling the heights wherever they find themselves
He formally welcomed the matriculating students to a most exciting adventure in CU advising them to abide by the institution’s core values and philosophy.

The vice chancellor, Prof Abiodun Atayero assured parents that they have not made a mistake by bringing their wards to the institution.

Covenant, he said, was built on sound philosophical foundation that emphasised a shift from form to skill; knowledge to empowerment, legalism to realism, points to facts and mathematics to lifematics.

Prof Atayero said the university had continued to receive external validations of the positive impacts of her unique approach to tertiary education.

“Recently, Times Higher Education (THE) of university ranking, globally announced CU in the 97 percentiles, which is out of about 27,000 universities globally. In that same ranking, Covenant emerged as the 9th in the ranking for Africa and the number one university in West Africa.

“We were thanking God for this tremendous achievement when on October 18, 2018 the subject rankings of the Times Higher Education was released, where Covenant emerged in the top 600 ranking globally in business and economics,” he stated.

According to the vice chancellor, the validations were both international and national.

“The Nigerian Graduate Report published by Stutern, an online platform that focuses on training and connecting talented youths of Nigeria with employers for internship as well as jobs, recently stated that Covenant had the most employable graduates in Nigeria.

“It’ is also worthy that while the graduates of Covenant are employed, the university also equips her students with entrepreneurial skills that ensures self-employment and this is validated by the Excellent Quality Education Award the university received recently. In addition, CU is one of the four institutions in Nigeria that have been selected by the African Development Bank in the coding for employment programme, which is aimed at creating nine million jobs, training 234, 000 youths in Information and Communication Technology (ICT) skills,” he explained.

While reminding that matriculation is significant in the annals of tertiary institutions because it consummated the students’ admission process and conferred on them the full rights of studentship, Prof Atayero assured parents and guardians that the matriculation ceremony signified a covenant that the eaglets they had brought to the institution would in five years time, be returned as fully grown eagles.

Goodwill messages were given by two of the parents, Mrs. Martha Nku and Mr Fancis Ekanem, on behalf of the others.

Mrs. Nku, who lauded the university for providing qualitative education enjoined the students to remain focused, committed and dedicated to their goal of achieving their aspirations.

Ekanem on his part described CU as the best university in Nigeria, adding that he felt privileged to have his children in the institution.

About 1, 694 students from the school of postgraduate studies and the four colleges of the institution took the matriculation oath.