709 Get First Class As Varsity Graduates 16,506 Students

About 709 students of the University of Lagos (UNILAG), out of 16,506, will be graduating with first class degrees as the institution holds its 56th convocation.

This was disclosed at the press conference on Wednesday to kick off activities for the convocation, even as the university graduates 16,506 students, 10,584 of whom are first-degree earners and 5,922 are postgraduate degree earners.

The institution’s management said the week-long convocation activities would begin on Friday, January 16, with a Jumaat Service at the University Central Mosque.

Speaking at the press conference, the university’s Vice-Chancellor, Professor Folasade Ogunsola, disclosed that the federal government has approved the recruitment of 350 academic and non-teaching staff at UNILAG to address the manpower shortage.

She disclosed that recruiting new staff would help mitigate the impact of Japa syndrome. “The recruitment process is currently underway. Significant progress was also made in staff promotions and welfare, alongside extensive capacity-building programmes in digital skills, research, administration, and entrepreneurship,” she said.

Breaking down the graduates, Prof Ogunsola noted that 709 finished with First Class honours out of the 10,584 undergraduate students. 543 earned Second Class Upper Division, 3,910 obtained Third Class, 69 graduated with Pass, while 330 ended with unclassified degrees.

She announced that Chukwuzubelu Umeozo, from the Faculty of Management Sciences, Department of Business Administration, was the overall best graduating student, with a perfect cumulative grade point average (CGPA) of 5.0.

The Vice Chancellor added that the university would confer honorary degrees on distinguished Nigerians, including former Attorney-General and Minister of Justice of the Federation, Barrister Kanu Agabi, CON, SAN, who will be awarded the degree of Doctor of Laws.  She also noted that Jubril Tinubu, CON, will receive the Doctor of Business degree.

‎”The Convocation Lecture titled – ‘Maximising Nigeria’s Demographic Dividend through Urgent Education Reform for Global Competitiveness in the 21st Century,’ will be delivered by Mr Orondaam Otto, at the J.F. Ade-Ajayi Auditorium. Mr Otto is the founder of Slum2School Africa and a pioneer of the first Virtual Learning Classroom in Sub-Saharan Africa,” she said.