Alumni Association Donates Laptop Computers to GCTU
The GCTU Alumni Association has donated five laptop computers to the university to support its logistical needs. In addition to the laptops, they also donated 10 HDMI cables.
The donation of the items was done by the President, Mr. Mark Amoamah who was supported by two members of the association: Dr. David King Boison and Dr. Nusrat-Jahan Abubakar – both staff of the university.
Presenting the items to the university, the President said the donation was their little gesture to support teaching and administrative work. This he said was “a small beginning for bigger and better things to come”.
Mr. Amoamah explained that the decision to donate laptops was informed by the university’s mandate as a centre of excellence in providing technology and engineering training, therefore what better to donate than laptops which are the primary tools in any technological endeavour.
The alumni President explained further that the proceeds for the purchase of the items were actually the leftover funds from the GCTU/Coventry Alumni Top 30 Achievers Awards Dinner which was held recently in honour of the visiting Vice-Chancellor of Coventry University, Prof. John Latham.
The alumni contributed resources to organize the event on 29th August where 30 of their members were awarded with plaques and citations.
Mr. Amoamah took the opportunity to commend the alumni for turning out in their numbers to support financially to make the dinner a success. He reserved specially praise for the efforts of Dr. David King Boison and Dr. Nusrat-Jahan Abubakar for the roles they played in organizing an amazing event within the space of two weeks.
Receiving the donations on behalf of the university, the Vice-Chancellor, Prof. Emmanuel Ohene Afoakwa, expressed gratitude to the alumni for the kind gesture which he described as “a good call coming at the right time”.
He mentioned that the university aims to create a pool of laptops for lecturers to use for teaching and these could not have come at a better time.
“We have already received five laptops from the Pro VC, so together with these, we now have 10. We will share them among the various faculties”, Prof said, adding that though it is not enough, it is a good place to start.
On behalf of Management, Prof. thanked the alumni for the presents. Quoting the President, he said, “in your own words, it is not done yet. You are going to look for more for us”.
Prof. expressed excitement about the growing involvement of the alumni in the day-to-day running of the university saying that “we hope to be able to involve you more so that you can play a very active role to support us”. We want to use this as a steppingstone to reach those who have strong networks that the university can tap into to get some of our urgently needed items for the effective running of the university”.
He was optimistic that some of the alumni who work with huge organizations with big CSR budgets such as GNPC, Ghana Gas and Tullow, were strategically positioned to be able to use their offices to help their alma mater secure funding to undertake some of its badly needed projects. He also appealed directly to the Alumni Association to consider helping with some infrastructure projects, suggesting the construction of a classroom block which can be named “Alumni Block”.
In summing up, Prof. called for another alumni event such as a dinner to rope in all the alumni groups of the university.
“We hope that you will be able to organize this again soon and make it even bigger and not only concentrate on the Coventry alumni alone but the wider GCTU alumni”, the VC added.
