Jannif grateful for graduates travelling long distances to attend graduation
Ikbal Jannif was grateful yesterday for students who travelled long distances and through adverse weather to attend the Fiji National University graduation. The FNU Chancellor said he had been involved in a several graduation ceremonies and realised its significance for the graduating students. “Graduation ceremonies are special to whoever is graduating,” he said. “For the students who graduated today, this morning or whenever; it is the pinnacle of their life. “They study hard, then they achieve something. Now they can move on to the next step.” Over a thousand students graduated yesterday at the ceremony, held at the Vodafone Arena in Suva. Mr Jannif said he was glad that parents and families of graduates remained for the entire ceremony, despite how long it took. When asked whether the university has internationally recognised programmes, he said: “When talking about international recognition, we have to be really careful because there are programmes that get recognised by different organisations like the accounting degree is recognised in a different way to the engineering programme.
“It’s not simply setting up the course and having it recognised,” he said. “Recognising the curriculum is one thing. But the programme recognition is much more than that and it can only come after the graduates have gone out into the field and have worked a few years.” Mr Jannif said the focus of the six-year-old university was primarily to educate for employment.
“Educate so they can be self sufficient going forward. You can either be an employee or you can become an entrepreneur,” he said.
As Chancellor, he said his biggest expectations were meeting the expectations of the various stakeholders. Edited by Rusiate Mataika
The FNU Chancellor said he had been involved in a several graduation ceremonies and realised its significance for the graduating students.