UAC offer more than education, they create opportunities for their students

UAC offer more than education, they create opportunities for their students

Nearly 50 year of experience support the educational management of the University of Abomey-Calavi (UAC) that offers courses and programs such as Bachelor (3 years), Master of Science and Master of Arts (5 years), and PhD (8 years) in several areas like science, technologies, agricultural, legal political, economics, management, humanities, societies, literature, languages, arts, education and training sciences, and it’s important to know that all these programs and courses are officially accredited by the Ministry of Higher Education and Scientic Research in its country.

Over 45,000 students are enrol in this institution that has a selective admission policy based on entrance examinations. The rate range is 40-50% making this beninese higher education organization an averagely selective institution.

The mission of the university is to contribute to sound scientific research and foster unemployment reduction in Benin and in Africa through quality training of its students, in order to do that, the institution encourage leadership to enhance its visibility in the world.

UAC encourages diversity and is open to any students meeting the entrance criteria irrespective of gender, race, skin colour, religion, nationality, political affiliation and age. They aim at becoming a world-class university committed to the development of Benin and other nations

The Pro Vice Chancellor of the University of Abomey-Calavi, professor Souaïbou FAROUGOU tell us more details about this institution that was established in 1970.

1. What are the competitive advantages of your company?

Besides training and research, the University of Abomey-Calavi offers to its students opportunities for pre-employment and the creation of startups in its business incubator.

2. What has been achieved by your company since its creation?

• The training of several thousand Beninese, African and international students as well as the production of thousands of scientific articles, different interventions in the development actions of Benin.
• UAC Start-up Valley, a Business Incubators Programme which is an innovative business hub with a high decent and sustainable job potential developed for the graduate students of the university.
• The establishment of the Foundation of the University which will help raise funds to finance the enterprise projects of the graduate students incorporated at the UAC Start-up Valley.
• The setting up of the competitive funding for research at UAC.
• The African Virtual Campus which trains lecturers for the production of didactics based audio-visual documents.
• The creation of the Web radio of UAC (http://radio.uac.bj) and the WebTV (uac.bj/uactv/new) to broadcast activities at the university level and develop the education system related to the use of numerical solutions.
• The Tele-education centre which offers degrees trainings in collaboration with an Indian university.
• The Centre for University pedagogy and quality insurance to strengthen teaching quality at UAC.
• UAC Volunteerism Program offered to at least 400 UAC’s graduates the opportunity to learn, gain experience, and serve others. Seminars, symposiums, conferences, workshops and cultural festivals were held so that students acquire necessary tools to face the future and improve student-lecturer relations.
• Since 2013, the university organise a job fair on the campus of UAC called “Connecting with the Professional World event (SEMOP)’’. This one week fair is opened to national organizations, private firms, private universities, municipalities in order to enable students to discover and interact with participating companies and governmental bodies on the main campus of UAC.
• The organization of the inter-University Cooperation Day (JCU) which is a held every two years. The JCU is organised collaboratively with other universities, embassies, international organizations, to share with students, mobility opportunities with regards to training and scientific research
• The organization of the Sciences and Technologies Week which gives opportunities to the local communities to know about innovations made by UAC’s laboratories
• The establishment of the Promotion and Transfer of Technologies Centre which will serve as an intermediary between the laboratories and research centres and the external world in the objectives to promote their findings.

3. What projects has your company developed?

• The setting up of a business incubator
• The setting up of an innovative volunteer program
• The tele-education program and the production of innovative academic tools
• The creation of the waste treatment center and the transformation of waste produced at the University into biogas and compost
• The creation of students registration platform available online at https://scolarite.uac.bj/okapiCollege/etudiant/ and the electronic management of Human Resources

4. What are the most challenging goals that your company has accomplished?

The main challenging goals that the Abomey-Calavi University has achieved is the normalization of the academic year, the professionalization of the training offered to students and the transparent management of the University’s resource.

5. How did you feel to win THE BIZZ?

We are very excited to be one of the winners of the BIZZ. This event gather prestigious companies from all over the world and we are proud to be among these winners.

INSTITUTIONAL INFORMATION

COMPANY: University of Abomey-Calavi (UAC)
NAME: Souaïbou FAROUGOU
POSITION: Pro Vice Chancellor
COUNTRY: Benin – Abomey-Calavi
WEB: www.uac.bj/web/
MAIL: vrcireip.uac@uac.bj
PHONE: 229 21 36 11 19