The Governing Council of Valley View University has been taken through a two-day orientation programme. The programme which focused mainly on governance at the tertiary educational level within a rapidly changing global atmosphere had Dr Paul Effah, a former Executive Secretary of the National Council for Tertiary Education as the principal facilitator.

Paul Effah is currently the President of the Radford University College at East Legon, Accra. He has held various positions including founding Registrar of the University for Development Studies, Tamale. He was the project director of the Senior Academic Leadership Training (SALT) programme for West Africa sponsored by the Carnegie Corporation of New York from 2010 to 2017. Dr Effah has written extensively on leadership, governance and management in higher education with the latest publication being “Towards Quality Higher Education in Ghana”. The facilitator has also consulted extensively on higher education administration and management in Ghana and Africa. Dr Effah is currently a consultant to Partnership for African Social and Governance Research based in Nairobi, Kenya.

Some of the topics discussed were Framework for Analysing Board Activities; Special Responsibilities of Council; Game Playing at Council; Indicators for Assessing Council Effectiveness; Higher Education vs Tertiary Education; Some Characteristics of Universities; The University of 2025; Some Implications of Changing Trends; Challenges Facing Universities: Effective Organisation of Council Meetings; Emotional Intelligence.

Pr. Dr. Thomas Techie Ocran, the Chair of Council and Prof Daniel Kwame Bediako, the Vice Chancellor of the University took turns in chairing sessions of the training programme.

The two-day programme which was well attended saw participants expressing satisfaction at the delivery and the general discourses that accompanied the training. They pledged to put the ideas shared into practice for the realisation of the University’s Vision for the next quinquennium.