29 Nov 2021

 Botswana Open University (BOU) has been commended for playing a critical role in driving the development of an e-education policy framework for the country and being at the forefront of its implementation.

Speaking during BOU’s 4th graduation ceremony recently,  Minister of Tertiary Education Research, Science and Technology Dr Douglas Letsholathebe further commended the institution for the great progress made in the application of technology in the teaching and learning space.

He said through this year’s theme, “Accelerating the digital education agenda”, BOU was communicating the tremendous progress made in digitising education.

“The importance of digitisation cannot be overemphasised as the global experience with the COVID-19 pandemic has clearly demonstrated the importance of technology in the various sectors of the economy, education included,” he said. 

     Dr Letsholathebe also noted that despite the challenges posed by COVID-19, BOU managed to produce 2 200 graduates compared to last year’s 1 690.

   Turning to the graduates, he said their graduation was a culmination of the hard work and resources that they dedicated to their studies.

Dr Letsholathebe encouraged the graduates to put to good use the knowledge and skills they had gained. 

 “The qualification you have earned is a demonstration that you are now different from the time you enrolled for your programme.  Let that be manifested in the way you interact and face the world. The nation and your families expect you to impact lives in one way or the other and I am confident that you will ably do that,” said the minister. 

For his part BOU vice chancellor Dr Daniel Tau said the pandemic had presented numerous challenges as well as opportunities for the institution.

He revealed that BOU managed to explore various ways of achieving it’s mandate of providing quality education, research and service through the open and distance learning mode.  

Dr Tau established that the theme was deliberately chosen to demonstrate the extent to which BOU had followed the path of offering technology-enabled education and training through well-considered and thought out strategy for technology-enhanced learning, teaching, assessment and student support.

“We are proud that we are making some significant contribution to human capital development in this country. This is evidenced by the gradual growth in our throughput rates over the years.  In this respect, we graduated 1 368, 1 647 and 2 349 in 2018/19, 2019/20 and 2020/21 academic years respectively. What is even more pleasing with the current graduation is that the output rates at undergraduate and postgraduate levels have grown by 30 per cent and 34 per cent respectively over the rates recorded in November 2020,” said Dr Tau. 

Congratulating the graduate, he said successfully completing studies during difficult times was indicative of their  perseverance and resilience. 

Studying at a distance, mediated by technology in an environment where connectivity challenges were experienced was not for the fainthearted, he said. 

The vice chancellor challenged the graduates to utilise their qualifications and to continue to upgrade themselves.ends