The Covenant University Management recently hosted a team from the Nigerian Research and Education Network (NgREN), under the auspices of the National Universities Commission (NUC), who were on ground to facilitate the onboarding of the institution onto the Eduroam/NgRENID Platform.

 While making his introductory remarks during their reception at the Vice-Chancellor’s Conference Room, the team leader, Mr. Oluwatobi Fowora, who is also the Chief ICT Officer of the organisation, clarified that the NgREN has been supporting Covenant University through the Africa Centres of Excellence project, via Covenant Applied Informatics and Communication Centre of Excellence (CApIC ACE). The support, he said, includes access to online resources, high speed broadband internet, subscription to online journals, antiplagiarism software, MATLAB and capacity building.

He expressed the delight of the team to be involved in the process of implementing the deployment of Eduroam and the onboarding of Covenant onto the NgREN Federated Identity platform (NgRENID). Eduroam, he said, is a global roaming service that enables students, researchers, and staff to access network resources seamlessly across participating institutions worldwide.

According to Mr. Fowora, the advantages of Eduroam are numerous; the platform provides secure and convenient access to network resources, eliminates the need for multiple usernames and passwords, and facilitates collaboration and resource sharing among researchers nationally and internationally.

Earlier in his welcome remarks, the Registrar, Mr. Emmanuel Igban, appreciated the team’s visit to the University, while expressing gratitude for the hand of God on the University, stating that the vision of the institution is to raise a new generation of leaders who would transform the society. He further stated that the vision is already speaking for itself and being validated through the trajectory of her students’ performance worldwide.

In his remarks, the Deputy Vice-Chancellor, Professor Lanre Amodu, commended the team for the work they are doing across Universities. He expressed the expectation that they would keep improving on the delivery in other to have higher impact on participating institutions worldwide.

The Vice-Chancellor, Professor Timothy Anake, thanked the NUC for supporting the NgREN project across the country. He commended the support the platform brings on board to research activities across institutions in the country. He pointed out that the NgREN is a wonderful and noble idea but requires a lot of clarification for all parties so as to have everyone’s interests protected. The implication of the onboarding, he said, requires adequate budgeting in other to put all costs into perspective.

He charged the NgREN team to address the concerns of the University, especially as regards, administrative issues and costing, in other to ease understanding and enable the partnership have a smooth take-off.

Also at the meeting were the Director, Financial Services, Pastor Samuel Audu; the Director, CSIS, Mrs. Pricilia Ajayi and the Principal Assistant Registrar, Mrs. Regina Tobi-David.