UNIMED commences second semester via online lectures 

The University of Medical Sciences, Ondo in Ondo State has commenced the second semester of the 2019 /2020 academic session on Monday with online lectures.

The Ondo State Government-owned university was shut down indefinitely a few weeks ago, following the outbreak of the deadly coronavirus in the country.

The Public Relations Officer of the institution, Mr Tope Akintayo, said the Vice-Chancellor, Prof Adesegun Fatusi, had during a recent meeting with the deans of faculties and heads of departments called for ideas on how to effectively manage the situation by teaching the students without exposing them to health hazards.

According to him, at the meeting, Fatusi had described the e-learning platform as a veritable tool with which lecturers could teach students of the university, stressing that there was a provision for interaction between students and lecturers.”

He said ,  “This ‘new normal’ approach will reduce student’s loss of time, keep them engaged in a directed lifelong learning process and provide an interesting opportunity to improve the quality of learning and a transparent means of assessing the lecturers.

To implement the e-learning management system, the deans of faculties and heads of the various departments in the university were divided into smaller groups and trained by members of the Information and Communications Technology  Centre headed by the ICT Director.

The heads of departments have been equipped to train the academic staff in their various departments.”

He added that the students were not expected to resume or go to the university to receive lectures, while the campus remained closed to academic activities.

Course advisers assigned to each course are expected to guide students and respond to enquiries via online platforms.

“The university management will continue to monitor the situation of the pandemic, national response and state government’s directives to aid optimal decisions that safeguard the lives of students, staff and other stakeholders of our great institution,” Akintayo stated.