Prof. Imoro Braimah, Provost of the College of Humanities and Social Sciences (CoHSS) has reminded the KNUST Business School (KSB) of the stiff competition it faces in the tertiary educational landscape, particularly from the proliferation of private universities offering similar programmes of study. He has therefore advised the School to come up with innovative programmes to be the most preferred institution for business education.
Prof. Imoro gave the reminder at the launch of the 10th Anniversary Celebration of the KSB. The celebration is under the theme: “Celebrating Our Past, Charting Our Future.” He reminded the school to create an enabling environment for faculty members to upgrade their skills for effective work. He also called for innovation in academic programmes that would meet market demands to sustain the school.
Prof. William Otoo Ellis, Vice-Chancellor and Chairman of the occasion, stated that the theme for the celebration was very appropriate since KSB’s journey had not been easy but a true reflection of their commitment, resilience, team work, corporate revolution and their sense of responsibility and ownership to make it work. He stated that most policies in the university and in sister universities at large were as a result of initiatives of the KSB, notably the parallel programmes. He commended the founding fathers, past Vice-Chancellors, faculty, staff, students and partners of the School for making KSB a huge success in business and entrepreneurship training in Ghana and beyond.
Dr. Ahmed Agyapong, Acting Dean, stated that the School had experienced significant growth in several areas including an increase in staff strength, student enrolment, staff development and promotion and infrastructural development. Dr. Agyapong stated that since 2009, KSB had graduated an average of 400 postgraduate students each year, exceeding all other faculties in the University. He went to explain that staff strength had also grown from 8 lecturers in 2005 to 29 in 2016. Staff capacity had also been enhanced through the Vice-Chancellor’s initiative and the school currently boasts of 20 PhD holders.
Dr. Agyapong also reiterated the call on management to, as a matter of urgency, have a strategic response to the reduction in the number of applications to the school in order to maintain their market leadership. He noted that competition from affiliate institutions and other private and public universities had led to such a development and called for measures to make KSB the preferred choice of business education in Ghana while welcoming healthy competition. The Acting Dean also appealed to management to recruit more staff and to improve infrastructure.
KSB was established in 2005 as an outgrowth of the 29-year old Department of Economics and Industrial Management which began by offering a postgraduate Diploma in Industrial Management, followed by M.A. in Industrial Management and MBA programmes. It was established to fulfill the vision of KNUST to provide the environment for excellence in teaching, learning and research in management and entrepreneurship in science and technology for the industrial and socio-economic development of Ghana and Africa.