SDD-UBIDS hungry for Law lecturers, other critical staff for the university

As is often the situation seeing the health and educational sector in Northern Ghana struggle to attract some critical staff, the Simon Diodong Dombo University of Business and Integrated Development Studies is not an exception.

According to the Vice Chancellor of the university, Prof. Philip Osei Duku, the Law School is finding it difficult to get a substantive Dean as well as Deans for other schools in the institution.

He made this revelation in his address during the second congregation of the University held on November 3, 2023.

"The launch of the SD-Dombo school of law, the Law school was eventually launched by Chairman of the Council and the Deputy Attorney General and Deputy Minister of Justice on the 1st of March, 2023. Management has also appointed one Professor Appiah Agyei of the University of Ghana Law School as consultant Dean to oversee the development and growth of the Law School. This is very important because combing through the universities of Ghana, it's really very hard to come by Senior lecturers in the Law Schools or even find professors so we're even lucky to find somebody who's able to dedicate a substantial part of his time to supporting our young faculty at the UBIDS Law School. In the meantime, the search for a substantive Dean has continued with qualified candidates mostly based in the Southern Ghana expressing a certain interest but expressing a certain difficulty in relocating to the Upper West.



"That's been the main challenge in the search for the Dean or even other Deans for the other schools including our Information and Communication Technology School. But the SD-Dombo University is never daunted. We still are marching on. We're looking forward to having an opportunity to make those critical and iconic appointments in appropriate times even as we get what we call financial clearance for hiring new staff for the university," he stated.



He added that the failure of the school to get the needed government's financial clearance in the last two years has made it impossible for the University to get a full complement of staff for its new faculties created in the last three years.

He however noted that management was implementing what he termed as a strategy of consolidating the schools that have been created with emphases on the faculty of Social Sciences, Faculty of Public Policy and Governance, Faculty of Information and Communication Technology, the School of Law, Faculty of Planning and Land Management and the Faculty of Integrated Development Studies.

During the 2nd Congregation, a total of 1,513 students were graduated as against 1,176 last year.

Miss Charity Antwi was adjudged the overall best student with a GPA of 4.80. She received an award of $500 from the school, an additional ¢1,000.00 and a brand new laptop courtesy Fidelity Bank.

On the University's measures put in place to turn around staff applications on time and to have them progress to their next levels and ranks without much problems, the Professor said:

"The human resource factor is of utmost importance because in industry, your most important asset is your human resource. And without nurturing your strong human resource base, you stand the chance of being relegated far behind with respect to your competitors.
So SD-Dombo University has done marvelously well in this area. And during the period under review, the University has processed 94 applications for senior members for promotion to various ranks which included both teaching and non-teaching staff and promoted same to those ranks."

"Out of the number or this number, 81 representing 86% were males while 13 representing 14% were females. There is certainly a certain imbalance there which we're working assiduously to improve. I mean the male-female equation in terms of hiring and promotion. 85% of these applications were processed under the Accelerated Staff Promotion policy which was put together by the Council of the SD-Dombo University. On the teaching front, a total of 62 senior members were promoted to various ranks and these were: 4 Associate Professors promoted to Professorial ranks, 15 Senior lecturers promoted to Associate Professorial ranks, 39 lecturers promoted to Senior lecturer ranks and 4 Senior staff upgraded to the rank of Assistant Registrar."

"Similarly, one Senior Librarian was promoted to the rank of Deputy Librarian who eventually was also appointed the University's librarian by the Council of the SD-Dombo. One Assistant Librarian was promoted to the rank of librarian and 4 junior staff were upgraded to Senior Registrar. So if you look at the statistics, it's very, very interesting. Out of the 4 that we initially had, we have promoted 4 more to the rank of Professor; Associate Professors, we have 15 now; Senior Lecturers - we have 39; Assistant Lecturer - we have promoted 4; Deputy Registrar - 1; Senior Assistant Registrar - 3; Junior Assistant Registrar - 13; Senior Internal Auditor - we have promoted 2; Accountant - 1; Assistant Accountant - 3; Assistant Procurement Officers - 2; Deputy Librarian - 1; Senior Librarian - 1; Junior Assistant Librarian - 4; Assistant Network Administrator - 1. These add up to 94."