IDeL Co-ordinators, Administrators Urged to support UEW Become Best in DE Delivery in West Africa

The Institute for Distance and e-Learning (IDeL) of the University of Education, Winneba (UEW) has held a four-day review workshop for its Study Centre Coordinators and Administrators in Kumasi with a call on participants to demonstrate devotion in supporting UEW to offer the best quality Distance Education (DE) in the West African sub-region.

The Director of IDeL, Prof. Francis Owusu-Mensah, who made the call at the opening session of the workshop on March 9, 2020, noted that the competitive nature of DE among institutuions has made it extremely crucial for all IDeL Coordinators and Administrators to be on top of their jobs, at all times, in order to maintain UEW’s lead in offering DE, particularly, in the country.

UEW is the beginner of DE programmes in Ghana and has over the years maintained a lead position in the industry with its top-notch programmes and very high number of student population.

Director of IDeL, Prof. Francis Owusu-Mensah speaking to attendees during the opening session

Prof. Owusu-Mensah, therefore, urged participants to maintain high level of professionalism by working tirelessly at all times to satisfy UEW’s foremost customers, the students.

The IDeL Director explained that in order to be effective and efficient, Coordinators and Administrators must take the initiative to solve challenges, allocate courses to only qualified tutors who must be regular and punctual to classes, share study modules to learners on time, select people with integrity for invigilation of examinations and most importantly, ensure the best relationship with IDeL students, who are mostly mature.

A cross-section of Coordinators and Administrators who were present at the workshop

Prof. Owusu-Mensah said that the Institute has very high expectations of the Coordinators and the Administrators, and urged them to be diligent and work exceptionally hard since signs of non-performance would lead to expulsion.

The Deputy Registrar at IDeL, Mr William Agyei-Bieni asked participants to take attendance of students to lectures very seriously so that they do not end up treating the DE programme as vacation classes where students do things at their whims without any repercussions.

Deputy Registrar, IDeL, Mr William Agyei-Bieni

“Those who do not meet the minimum number of stipulated contact hours for lecture attendance must not be allowed to take part in examinations. They are the ones who often end up in the examination halls cheating and causing troubles,” he said.

Some of the key topics treated at the Review Workshop included Learner Support Services and the place of Guidance and Counselling; Characteristics and Challenges of DE Studies; Course Module Distribution: Challenges and the way forward; Duties of Study Centre Coordinators and the Student Registration Process.