Rose Ejembi, Makurdi
Vice Chancellor of
, Prof. Richard Kimbir has finally confirmed that the President Muhammadu Buhari led Federal Government has changed the name of the institution.
Recall that when the media was awash with news of the name change of the institution a few weeks ago, the management of the institution said it was yet to receive any circular to that effect.
However, the Vice Chancellor, in his speech during the matriculation of new students of the institution for the 2018/2019 academic session on Wednesday disclosed to the gathering that the federal government has changed the name of the institution from Federal University of Agriculture Makurdi (FUAM) to Joseph Tarka (JTU).
Kimbir said the institution was still expecting an official communication from the federal government to specify the mandate, vision and mission of the university’s new status.
He enjoined the new students to define their priorities and settle down quickly to face the challenges ahead, stressing that their study requires commitment, determination and strict discipline.
While noting that within his two years of overseeing the affairs of the university, the first ever Open Education Resources (OER) platform launched at the institution had been rated one of the best and mostly used OER in Nigeria.
He said the OER with more than 381 profiles of researchers and staff had been able to enrich the university website with intellectual collections.
The feat, according to Kimbir, had tremendously improved the ranking of the institution from 47th to the 33rd position in the ranking of universities in Nigeria and that the trend would continue as the school strive to attain its desired height in the future.