Dubbed, “Technovate”, the Challenge is intended to enhance students‘ skills in system development by providing Information Technology (IT) solutions to businesses, institutions and individual daily problems.

The competition started with 20 teams. They screened and got five-Tech connect Code tech, See technology, Dev kings and Tech land, which are vying for the ultimate prize (yet to be mentioned) at stake.

The Vice-Chancellor, Prof. Frederick Kwaku Sarfo, in a speech read on his behalf, observed that gone were the days when ITE students could go through a whole four-year degree programme without much practical work to develop a knack for innovation to help address challenges.

But, “the times have changed so much, rote learning is now archaic.  Learning is practical, learning is critical-thinking, and analytical and those are critical for solving problems and bringing life improvement”, he said.

Since becoming an autonomous University, management, according to the Vice Chancellor, had noticed the concerted effort by various departments of the university to increase the practical components of the courses they offered.

“This move by the ITE comes to add to the list, and helps to improve the University’s image as a destination for modern education and training”.  

He, therefore, encouraged the students to take the practical session seriously and seek to learn enough for their lives after university.  

“Ours is to give you the training so that you would not end up in long queues seeking employment opportunities that hardly exist. From here, you should be able to set up your own business, run it, and employ others so that together we can all fight this unemployment situation that saddles us as a country”, he urged.  

Prof. Sarfo assured the students that whatever solutions that would be found to the numerous ICT challenges being endured at the University, following the challenge, would be adopted for implementation to improve the situation in the University.

Head of Department and a senior lecturer, George Asante, on his part, said the department aimed to produce graduates equipped with the necessary academic and professional competencies and skills through the use of innovative techniques to enable them to teach effectively in pre-tertiary institutions and also capable of applying the competencies and skills of IT in the field of work.

Since the inception of the Department, he noted it has trained over 7,000 graduates who were equipped with the knowledge, skills, and professionalism in the field of IT.

Prof. Yarhands Dissour Arthur, Dean of the Faculty of Applied Science and Mathematics Education, who chaired the function, asked the students to use the opportunity to be more innovative to create a niche for themselves outside the University.