Redeemer’s University, Ede, Osun State, has explained that the recent increase in tuition fees was driven by rising operational costs and the need to implement the new salary structure approved by the Federal Government for university workers.
The Vice-Chancellor of the university, Prof. Shadrach Akindele, disclosed this on Monday during a press briefing ahead of the institution’s 18th convocation ceremony.
Akindele said the rising cost of living had significantly increased the cost of running the university, making a review of fees necessary to sustain its operations and maintain the quality of services provided to students.
He explained that private universities were also under pressure to adjust staff salaries in line with what is obtainable in federal universities to prevent losing qualified personnel.
“The economic reality of the society in which we are living has made things become more expensive, such that our running costs have increased considerably,” Akindele said.
According to him, failure by private universities to adjust salaries in line with the new federal structure could result in a mass migration of staff to government-owned universities.
He said, “For you to be able to keep your staff, you must match at least what the Federal Government is paying. Because we are a private university, we don’t get grants from government, and we don’t want to compromise on the quality of service we provide; we rely on the fees we collect from students to pay our staff.”
The Vice-Chancellor also disclosed that 2,471 students would graduate from the university during its 18th convocation.
He said 2,030 students would receive Bachelor’s degrees from the university and its affiliate institutions, while 441 students would graduate at the postgraduate level.
Akindele said the convocation programme would include a lecture to be delivered by the Chief Executive Officer of A’s Consulting, Erinle Adeola.
The university will also hold an award and recognition ceremony to honour individuals whose contributions have had a significant impact on the university community.
Highlighting the institution’s achievements during the outgoing academic year, the Vice-Chancellor said the university had secured full approval for 10 new undergraduate programmes.
The newly approved programmes are Broadcasting, Public Relations, Advertising, Information and Media Studies, Journalism, Film Production, Criminology and Security Studies, Biotechnology, Software Engineering and Information Systems.
The Vice-Chancellor said the new programmes were part of the university’s efforts to expand its academic offerings and respond to changing educational and professional demands.
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