From Sola Ojo, Kaduna
• Prof. Ango, Secretary of Tita, Mohammed in group photography after signing the MoU
As a part of the implementation strategy of its major strategic plan for the institution’s academic advancement in northern Nigeria, the Kaduna State University (KASU) and an indigenous Information and Communication Technology (ICT) firm called Tita Universal Service Ltd, yesterday signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on e-timetable.
What this means is that Tita Universal Services would be assisting KASU’s lecturers and students alike in managing their class schedules, assignments, and course materials effectively without paying any money.
Fielding questions from newsmen shortly after the signing of the MoU, Secretary, Titas Universal Service Ltd, Aisha Aminu Mohammed, hinted that her organisation came up with the application based on the sad experience of a female student of Imo State University,
According to her, “an incident happened where a friend who was in Imo State University had a class one morning without knowing that the class was canceled. She went to the empty class and on her way back, she was involved in an auto crash and she died. Based on that and related experiences, we came up with is friend-user application.
“Again, KASU is one of the fastest growing universities in the country as it has produced several graduates from different fields.
“The application has the value and business sides. The value side is where the students get information about their course schedules and activities including their course materials, academic calendar, and calculator among others.
“So both the students and the institution are not paying anything. In return, we are the ones who will pay them money based on the traffic we might generate from its usage.
“We have students who are already using the application in some of Nigerian universities. This is the first official launch. It will save the students time and cost”, she added.
The Vice Chancellor of KASU, Professor Abdullahi Ibrahim Musa, who was represented by Deputy Vice-Chancellor, Prof Yusha’u Ibrahim Ango, said the initiative was a welcome development because it was in line with the mission of the institution.
To him, “as a university, we have just concluded a major strategic plan and the thrust of that plan is that we want to ease the ways we do things and update, leveraging the latest technologies.
“So the plan overall is IT serving which is why we welcome this kind of initiative whereby some tech firms approached us to provide some services for us and our students. This is why we welcome them and agreed to sign this MOU”, he said.
On how ready were the lecturers to use the app he said, “the application is easy from what they have demonstrated. It is an easy application both for the students and for the lecturers in terms of timetabling submission of assignments and things like that online”.
Tita Universal Service Ltd is an indigenous ICT firm that develops and designs mobile applications. Its latest application is the Tita, which is an online interactive timetable platform that gives students first-hand information about their course schedules and activities.