The
University of the Gambia’s First Acting Vice Chancellor, Mr Jenung Manneh on
Wednesday 11th June received in audience the Director of St. Mary’s College of
Maryland’s (Promoting Education and Cultural Exchange) PEACE Program, Prof.
Bill Roberts, ORG and the National Coordinator of the PEACE Program, Mrs. Yamai
Secka-Jack at the Faculty of Law in Kanifing.
Speaking at the review meeting of the partnership, Prof. Bill Roberts congratulated Mr Jenung Manneh on his appointment as Acting Vice Chancellor of UTG and renewed his commitment to continue to strengthen the existing collaboration between the two institutions.
He briefed the Acting Vice Chancellor on some of the recent developments at St. Mary’s College of Maryland with regards to changes in the senior management at the College.
The changes include a new President who is the first female African-American to assume that position.
It would be recalled that St. Mary’s College of Maryland, USA conferred a Doctorate degree to HE the President of the Republic of The Gambia.
The Peace program would be celebrating its twenty years of existence in the Gambia next year which will coincide with the 200th anniversary of the city of Banjul.
In addition, Prof. Bill highlighted the gains of the program for the year under review and some of the challenges faced by the exchange program, one of which is the recruitment of students from the US, which he partly attributed to the recent Ebola outbreak in West Africa, the global economic shocks as well as the cost of air tickets to The Gambia from the US.
He however assured the Acting Vice Chancellor that they will continue to promote and introduce new strategies in order to increase the number of students in the coming years.
For her part, the National Coordinator of the PEACE program, Mrs Yamai Secka Jack also congratulated the Acting Vice Chancellor on his new position and reaffirmed her continuous commitment to both the UTG and SMCM through the PEACE Program which benefits both students and faculty in the USA and The Gambia.
The PEACE program also takes students to the USA to study at SMCM and builds capacity at the tertiary, NGO, CBO and other institutional levels through the service learning projects students and faculty from SMCM are engaged in when they come to The Gambia.
In his closing remarks, Acting Vice Chancellor Manneh commended both Prof. Bill and Mrs Yamai Secka Jack for their selfless and invaluable service to UTG, The Gambia and humanity.
He spoke of Prof. Bill Roberts’ love for the Gambia dating back to more than three decades when he first visited the Gambia in the late seventies as a Peace Corps Volunteer.Since then he has been very supportive of the then Yundum College, Gambia College until the advent of the UTG.
He thanked them for their immense contribution to the welfare and development of the UTG and the Gambia in general and assured them of the UTG administration’s support at all times.
By
Abdoule Sillah
UTG
International Relations Office