UI VIRTUAL LEARNING: THE DEAFENING SILENCE OF THE MANAGEMENT ON DATA SUPPORT

Foyin Ejilola
About four weeks into the virtual semester of 2020/2021, the UI-ERT Committee conducted an online data support poll. Students and lecturers of the University of Ibadan were advised to fill in the requested details in the online form to be beneficiaries of the data support that the university management promised. This was done in a bid to relieve everyone of the financial burden that comes with running a smooth virtual learning system.
However, six weeks have passed since the forms have been filled and nothing seemed to be forthcoming from the concerned areas. The silence from the UI-ERT Committee and the University management has been deafening. Many students who had been hopefully waiting for the management to fulfil its mandate have resigned to fate and resorted to financing their data subscriptions. Many of them even doubt if the university management would keep to their promise at all as the semester is near its end.
Furthermore, the virtual semester which the data support is supposed to serve the purpose of aiding is running to an end and examinations are fast approaching. There are also speculations that the forthcoming examinations will be conducted physically as some lecturers have given their students hints that physical classes would be held a week or two before exams.
In a short interview with the Student Union President, Olusegun Akeju, he disclosed that the university management is facing some challenges. Akeju, who once said in an interview that the pressure from the SU prompted the decision to support the virtual semester with data, said the Union has reached out to the management.
In his words: “When we reached out to the management, we were informed that UI has paid the company involved, but they have been the ones who are yet to respond.”
He further stated that the union is mounting pressure on the university management so that the undisclosed company in question would respond in no distant time.
In conclusion, one can only hope that the data support would be given when it can serve a beneficial purpose not when the semester is over.