Catholic University of Central Africa makes new reforms

Ireneaus Chia Chongwain

Officials of the Catholic University of Central Africa, UCAC, have taken a firm and irreversible decision to adopt the LMD system as from this academic year. The decision was disclosed during the recent official re-opening of the university for the 2006-2007 Academic Year. 

While the decision has been taken to render studies at UCAC more responsive to the challenges posed by globalisation, the rhetorical questions that marked the speech of the Grand Chancellor, Christian Cardinal Tumi, signified that meaningful reforms must not only be accompanied by corresponding academic re-adjustments, but infrastructural development as well.
He was indirectly sounding the wake-up bell for both the staff and students of that institution. The desire for UCAC to turn over a new leaf was expressed in the address made on the occasion by its rector, Rev Father Christian Mofor, who said, "our University, which has been created and operates absolutely in a world undergoing perpetual mutation and the quest for recognition, must have as its ideal, the total involvement in the present." 
He added that UCAC cannot afford to operate in isolation, or refuse to adopt modern concepts and procedures within this ever growing competitive era. He called on the officials of the university to break away from its past tradition, when the university was run exclusively on the basis of its own methods and procedures, appealing that they should subscribe to what he described as, "the school of new exigencies."
It was against the backdrop of the new exigencies inherent in the LMD system, that studies kicked off at the Faculty of Social and Management Sciences, while waiting that other faculties  follow suit, hopefully,  from the 2007/2008 Academic Year.
The LMD system makes provision for three years of study at the undergraduate level to obtain a bachelor's degree, two years of study to obtain a master's degree and three years to obtain a PhD.
According to the Dean of the Faculty of Theology, Jacques Fédry, who presented the inaugural lesson of the day which centred on the LMD System and the Augustinian Pedagogic Intuition, the LMD system has the advantage that it enables students to build and define their academic profiles better through personal initiatives, prepares them better for subsequent vocational and professional careers, favours a greater mobility of students within their own institutions and the external world and encourages continuous training or studies for those who so desire. 
In a nutshell, the LMD system has been conceived, Jacques Fédry pointed out, to ensure greater spatial, social and professional mobility on the one hand and diversification on the other two indispensable requirements that are unfortunately lacking within the higher education world in Cameroon at the moment.
Father Jacques Fédry said within the university set-up, the LMD system is an educational option that cannot be avoided when placed within a global context, comparing it to the Euro in the domain of finance, and the embryonic European Constitution in the political sphere in Europe.
Based on the recognition of the prowess of the LMD system, Father Christian Mofor commented on the need to open an Academic Secretariat to follow up changes within the new higher education environment, the opening of new faculties and disciplines in UCAC, the development of new facilities and the maintenance of existing infrastructure with the assistance of funding partners and the granting of scholarships to deserving and needy students.
While acknowledging the positive changes that had taken place over the years in UCAC, the Grand Chancellor, Christian Cardinal Tumi, threw more light on the academic spirit that should accompany the LMD system - a system where "the teacher will no longer be considered as the centre of the world, the unique source of knowledge, the provider of all knowledge, or a human encyclopaedia and the source of all scientific truth."
He added that the new system incorporates fundamental Christian and African values like humility.  Christian Cardinal Tumi posited that, intellectual humility with regards to knowledge is an indispensable requirement within the university milieu, as every humble teacher should be guided by the recognition that his student could be potentially more knowledgeable than he is.
He questioned whether the Cameroonian culture could accommodate the present academic metamorphosis, whether the communicational environment could effectively respond to the new demands, if at the pedagogic level corrective measures had been taken to ensure a smooth transition from the old to the new system, and wondered whether students had the multilingual and financial capabilities to take full advantage of the opportunities offered by the LMD system.
This line of questioning was meant to call the attention of the staff and students of UCAC to what must be done to derive maximum benefits from the LMD system. The representative of the Minister of Higher Education pledged government's continuous support for UCAC as it joins what he qualified as the "University Free Zone," the basic mainstay of the LMD system.
The Grand chancellor stressed that while it is important to lay emphasis on the quality of studies at UCAC, the church is more interested in the model of the people being trained- people who will provide "Africa and the world with seasoned administrators of persons and property, not only very competent but also honest, administrators kneaded with a human and ethical culture capable of resisting diverse temptations that can ruin the common good."
The dice has been cast, the rules and requirements defined; the rest is now up to the actors- administrators, staff and students of UCAC.