University of Okara approves staff recruitment

Lahore: University of Okara’s syndicate has approved the formation of 10 new academic departments under the existing four faculties along with the recruitment on 123 teaching and 107 non-faculty positions.

The decision was taken in the fourth meeting of the syndicate, chaired by Punjab Higher Education Minister Yasir Hamayun Sarfraz. The meeting was held at Punjab Civil Secretariat, Lahore.

UO Vice-Chancellor Prof Dr Zakria Zakar tabled all the financial and infrastructural issues of the new university and demanded the syndicate members that they pay serious attention to their long-term solutions so that the standard of the education could be improved.

The syndicate unanimously allowed the university to establish 10 new departments and launched the programmes, including social and cultural studies, anthropology, criminology, mass communication, library sciences, physical education, law, computer sciences, physics and statistics. The body also approved the budget for setting up new research and practical laboratories in various departments.

The minister urged the VC to build the entire necessary academic infrastructure to come up to the accreditation requirements of Higher Education Commission (HEC). Talking to the syndicate, the minister said, “Our government’s priority is to build education infrastructure in the country by allocating more budget and powers to the existing universities instead of establishing new ones.”

On the university’s request, the syndicate allowed it to to adopt the University of Gujrat’s statutes until it formulates its own statutes, however, the minister indicated that the government would try to implement standardised set of governing laws for every public and private university.

The body approved the release of pending wages of the university’s visiting faculty and contractual support staff, including the security guards. The syndicate also unanimously agreed on the appointment of Dr Iqbal Chawla as permanent member of the Selection Board.

UOE: A seven-day training workshop under the title of “Cascading of Master Training; Faculty Professional Development Programme” has concluded on Tuesday here at University of Education, Township, Lahore.

University of Education (UOE) Vice-Chancellor Prof Dr Rauf-i-Azam was the chief guest of the concluding ceremony. While addressing the participants, the VC said teaching was not just delivery of lecture rather it was a full fledge learning process, which included delivering lecture, assessment and evaluation of students, use of latest technologies in teaching learning process. He urged the participants to be very honest while making assessment and evaluation of students because their assessment shapes the academic destiny of the students. He advised the non-PhD faculty members to do their PhD as early as possible and the PhD faculty members to enhance their knowledge continuously.