Vice-Chancellor Receives CBAS and Toyota Ghana Delegation

The Vice-Chancellor, Prof. Nana Aba Appiah Amfo with the delegation

A delegation from College of Basic and Applied Sciences (CBAS) and Toyota Ghana has paid a courtesy call on the Vice-Chancellor, Prof. Nana Aba Appiah Amfo.  The visit was to provide an update of the progress of work on the ongoing Toyota and CBAS ultramodern training centre and multi-purpose workshop.

Prof. Boateng Onwona-Agyeman, Provost, CBAS, indicated that the project was about 50% complete and likely to be fully completed by July 2022. He announced that as part of the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) signed between the University and Toyota Ghana Limited to provide a US$1,000,000 ultramodern training centre and a multi-purpose workshop for the School of Engineering Sciences (SES), Toyota Ghana Limited will equip the facility with tools and equipment worth $1m and give an additional $2m to SES to purchase more equipment.

Prof. Boateng Onwona-Agyeman, Provost, CBAS

Prof. Onwona-Agyeman disclosed the decision of Toyota Ghana to set up a scholarship scheme of $100,000 for a 10-year period to needy but outstanding SES students. The Provost also added that Toyota Ghana and its partners have agreed to offer internship opportunities to SES students.

While welcoming the delegation, Prof. Amfo thanked the Provost for the update and commended him for leading the negotiations on behalf of the University. She further extended her appreciation to Toyota Ghana and noted how the establishment of the training school and workshop will be of mutual benefit to both parties.

“As a research intensive University, we want to see our faculty and students provided with an avenue where they can conduct research and work with practitioners. Often, we talk about a disjoint between research activities and industry needs but this provides a perfect partnership where you feed into our research and our research feeds into your industry activities”, she stated.

The Vice-Chancellor said, “As an institution, we are seeking to institutionalise internships which will be backed by policy so I’m happy with this arrangement which provides our students with hands-on training while they are here. I believe that these are some of the things that will make our graduates more employable’.

Prof. Amfo also appealed to Toyota Ghana to consider expanding the scholarship package beyond CBAS, to the College of Health Sciences and other disciplines since many more brilliant students require financial assistance.

Members of the Toyota Ghana team present, comprised Kohji Yanaka, MD, Toyota Ghana; Tomoyuki Kishi, Managing Director, Airu Developers Ltd and Mr. Henry Datsomor, Project Manager, Toyota Ghana.

Prof. Abu Yaya, Ag. Dean, School of Engineering Sciences and Mr. Emmanuel Baidoo, College Secretary, CBAS were also present at the meeting.