Students seek guaranteed improvements with proposed UG tuition hike

Students listen to Vice-Chancellor Jacob Opadeyi and other presenters during the consultation. Not many students were in attendance initially but the number grew as more and more trickled into the George Walcott Lecture Theatre at the Turkeyen Campus yesterday

A consultation between administrators and students of the University of Guyana (UG) degenerated into a yelling session of sorts for several moments when Vice-Chancellor Jacob Opadeyi found himself facing an interrogation over the proposed hike of tuition fees and his assurances that the institution would deliver better.

Opadeyi told around 300 students who gathered in the George Walcott Lecture Theatre (GWLT) at the Turkeyen Campus for the first consultation that a number of factors, including bad management over a number of years, has put the university in the situation it is in today.

UG Registrar Vincent Alexander explained to students that in 1994 it was decided that tuition fees would stand at US$1,000. When the decision was taken, the exchange rate between the US and Guyana dollar was US$127 to $1. Since then, the exchange rate has soared, due to inflation and other reasons, to US$210 to $1, and a proposal has