Overview Of UG College Of Basic And Applied Science

Overview Of UG College Of Basic And Applied Science

The College of Basic and Applied Sciences (CBAS) became operational in August, 2014 when the University of Ghana adopted the collegiate system of governance. The CBAS consists of five Schools, two Institutes and three Centres.
It is the belief of the College that success depends on understanding the new wind of change and equilibrium, strong leadership and stakeholders’ commitment to move this process of change. It is therefore our belief at the CBAS that in this modern era dominated by the knowledge economy, a University that seeks to remain stationary will fail. Hence, we seek to consolidate all efforts to lay a strong and sustainable foundation in all measurement categories of academic productivity (high quality deliverables), that contribute to national development needs and enhance international competiveness of the University of Ghana within the next ten years. The College administration intends to harness this vision through total team effort.
Another variable for the achievement of the vision is discipline and integrity. This stems from the fact that a society that loses its discipline and integrity is as good as dead because development and progress become a nightmare. Thus, integrity, commitment, respect and loyalty remain the core values of the College.
Attaining academic excellence remains a top priority of the College as the University seeks to become a research intensive World-Class University. To archive this, the College needs to revise its existing programmes to conform to relevance and national needs and introduce novel and multi-disciplinary market-driven programmes. As, such, the College needs to create and enabling environment that makes the University of Ghana a centre of attraction for cutting-edge research as well as high quality research and learning. The College is also keen to institute human capital development programmes to train both academic and administrative staff in the core functions of their duties in order to archive the twin goals of efficiency and effectiveness. All these would require resource mobilisation and prudent financial management.
Community engagement is a prime function of every University. As such, the College has commenced programmes and actives to create visibility and public awareness of its activities and expertise through media interactions, well designed web page, an annual College activities bulletin, College days and durbars, radio and television discussion on topical issues and newspaper features among others.
Regarding the realisation of the College’s vison, a number of activities have been undertaken. These include the setting-up of Boards and Committees to execute the mandate of the College, streamlining of administrative procedures for both academic and human resource duties under the collegiate system of governance, for efficiency and effectiveness.
A College strategic plan is in the process of being developed to guide the College in the realisation of its mandate within the framework of the overall University strategy.
The College has also commenced the process of rationalizing its courses and programmes with the view to avoid duplication and ensure greater flexibility in students’ choice of programmes and courses.  In this same vein, a Committee set up to develop a Microbiology programme has submitted proposals for the undergraduate, MPhil and PhD programmes in Microbiology.  It is hoped that upon approval, the programme would be mounted in the 2016-2017 academic year.
The College as part of its efforts to develop research skills and build research leadership capacity among its faculty organized a workshop on developing research leadership skills which primarily aimed at mobilizing the academic leadership in the College for focused research and fundraising.  The workshop was also organized to foster increased interaction and cohesion among faculty in the College.  The workshop was held at the Mac Dic Royal Plaza Hotel at Koforidua from October 23 to 25, 2014 with a total of 54 participants from the constituent units of the College.
Similarly, the College deems it expedient to pursue excellence in its management systems parallel to the excellence in its teaching and research programmes.  Towards this end, the College has initiated plans to organise a workshop on writing skills for support staff in the College Administrative category.  This is part of the efforts to build capacity for the College administration. This would be done with the assistance from the Carnegie Writing Centre and the UG Carnegie project.
The College has instituted a CBAS Lecture Series which requires all Schools and Institutes in the College to organise one lecture per academic year.  The College would publish the entire lecture series at the end of each academic year.  The maiden Lecture Series was held on Thursday April 30, 2015 at the Great Hall.  The speaker was Professor Thomas Mba Akabzaa, the Chief Director of the Ministry of Petroleum who was formally with the Department of Earth Science, Legon.  The title of the lecture was “Ghana’s Economic Development Challenge:  The Energy Factor”
The College is also making efforts to collaborate with a number of Universities in the area of research and graduate training.  So far, the College has initiated steps to collaborate with underlisted Universities:

  • Technical University of Denmark
  • University of Rochester
  • Harvard University
  • Utsunomiya University
  • Gifu University
  • Kyoto University and
  • Kochi University

Overall, the College of Basic and Applied Sciences will strategically position itself as a Centre of Excellence in Ghana and provide leadership in science related endeavours through high impact teaching, research as well as collaborations and partnerships.