The Need for Team Altruism to Ensure the Welfare of AFASites

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By Olanshile Ogunrinu

The primary purpose of every Students’ association is to represent the interests of its members, to ensure the efficient provision of all welfare services to students among others. However, maybe the leadership of the Akoem-led Team Altruism has been disconnected from the reality Afasites are subjected to from the confines of the executive secretariat or maybe they are of the close-minded standpoint that student welfare is limited to organizing parties.

Courses that have large numbers of students taking them face the problem of overcrowding, as either the classes available are not large enough to take them or there are not enough seats available to take them in the classes large enough to take them.  For instance, Ayoola (not real name), a 100 level student of history, received about 3 lectures on his feet in the second week of resumption due to the lack of seats in the limited classroom. Fresh students taking a course like CLA 103 have also complained of overcrowding in room 32.

Also, in the faculty’s largest lecture theatre (LLT), especially in classes with a high number of students like ENG 116 and PHI 102 which have law students borrowing the courses in attendance, the working ceiling fans only blow at ridiculously snail speed that ends up doing nothing, culminating in making students resort to using their notes as fans to survive the heat and stuffiness which has come with the current hot weather conditions in Nigeria. All these are not only psychological noises which not only prevent the students from focusing on the ongoing class, but it also makes students grossly uncomfortable and learn in unfavorable conditions.

While there are also speakers in the corners of the LLT, it is uncertain if they are working. Students sitting at the back most times miss what the lecturer says and have to resort to borrowing notes from their friends who sat in the front seats. A functioning public address system is the required panacea to cover this deficiency.

And is there also a classroom room with a functioning projector in the whole of the faculty? A lecturer recounts his ordeal trying to get a software app to project the examples he was trying to show the class because the one in the lecture room is not working. A functioning projector in the lecture rooms will aid teaching and make presentations easier.

While it can be said the executives are not solely in charge of the maintenance and renovation of these facilities, they should still get to the students, get to know their lacks and wants and ensure appropriate representation of these inadequacies before the authority. They can also push for the opening for the new classes built for the faculty.

They have the power to a large extent to influence the management’s decisions as regards the improvement of these facilities. They should ensure that it is used for the betterment of the welfare of AFASITES which was of course what they promised.

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