Post Graduate Diploma in Cultural Administration (PGDCA) students at the National Institute for Cultural Orientation (NICO) Training School, Abuja Study Centre, who are also known as, ‘Culture Diplomats’, have called for the decentralization of the Institute’s academic programmes to the six geopolitical zones in the country to allow easy access and nationwide impact.
This was part of the students’ request to the Management of the Institute on Tuesday, 20th September, 2016, while on a courtesy visit to the Executive Secretary of NICO, Associate Professor Barclays Foubiri Ayakoroma, in the Boardroom of NIO HQ in Abuja, the Federal Capital Territory.
According to the leader of delegation, who is the President, Bush House Nigeria and Class Governor, Akparawa Michael Bush, their request was in recognition of the important role the NICO Training School can play in the revitalization of our culture and the diversification of nation’s economy.
To them, the Executive Secretary’s liberal and democratic style of leadership has helped in no small way to place NICO in the front row among the best-performing government agencies in Nigeria and globally, pledging that they will work assiduously towards sustaining the legacies of the Institute, even after the completion of their programme.
While attributing the sterling academic performance of the class so far to the good working relationship between them and Management of the Training School, the students expressed their profound appreciation, saying: “We appreciate the good working relationship between the Training School Management under a very loving and motherly Coordinator, Dr. (Mrs.) Regina Onuoha and our Class. We are pleased to report that Dr. Onuoha and her Management have not only created a conducive environment for learning but they also offer us incredible access round the clock”.”
Further stressing that they were conscious of who they were as Culture Diplomats, the students pleaded that despite their input and contributions to the growth of the school, their set should not be used to judge future sets either by their standards or achievements, saying whatever they had achieved was motivated by Management’s exemplary leadership and their unity of purpose.
In his response, the NICO ES commended the PGDCCA Class 2016 of the Abuja Study Centre of the NICO Training School, saying whatever that is happening with the Training School today was in line with his assessment that the Training School had become more exciting because it was no more just a NICO staffers’ affair.
Prof. Ayakoroma disclosed that while Management had started the process of establishing Training Centres in the various zones, there were still little challenges the Institute still needed to overcome but expressed optimism that with what was currently happening in the School, NICO will be able to establish the Training Centres across the country.
He noted that the initiative of Class Diplomats to register the Society of Culture Ambassadors of Nigeria (SCAN), as an umbrella body of the alumni of the Training School was quite laudable; stressing that history will remember them as their names would be written in gold as those who blazed the trail in the formation of the Society.
Present with the Executive Secretary during the courtesy visit were Mr. Alex Omijie (Director, Orientation & Cultural Affairs), Mr. Law Ikay Ezeh (SA-ES), and Dr. Regina Onuoha (Coordinator, NICO Training School, Abuja Study Centre).
Caleb Nor
Corporate Affairs Unit
NICO, Abuja