UG campuses to benefit from ICT upgrade

The University of Guyana is partnering with the Public Telecommunications Ministry to significantly upgrade the University’s ICT platforms and digital inter-connectivity at all its campuses and centres around the country.
This partnership will be cemented in the near future, when the Ministry’s National Data Management Authority (NDMA) and UG co-sign a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU).
According to a joint statement issued by UG and the NDMA on Thursday, this collaboration, which began in late 2016, involves highest level negotiations between Public Telecommunications Minister Catherine Hughes and UG Vice Chancellor Professor Dr Ivelaw Griffith.
The University’s technical team was led by Professor Dr Paloma Mohamed-Martin, Deputy Vice Chancellor of Philantrophy, Alumni and Civic Engagement and Communications; Dr Fitzgerald Yaw, Director of the Office of Strategic Initiatives; and Rayman Khan of the Centre for Information Technology.
The NDMA’s technical team was led by its Chairman, Floyd Levi, and included Dr Samantha Scotland and Director Malcolm Williams.
These two teams have been collaborating over the past few months, and together have conducted a detailed assessment of the existing fibre-optic system on the Turkeyen and Tain campuses, to determine what additional facilities would be required to connect them as a network.
The collaboration has also produced a campus Wi-Fi hotspot system and has seen the installation of two state-of-the-art teleconferencing suites at Turkeyen and Tain. These will be used in online delivery of courses between the campuses in Guyana and international institutions. The campus fibre network will also be connected to the Georgetown fibre-optic network.
At the signing of this MoU, the university is expected to demonstrate the uses of the teleconferencing suite, a gift from Huawei Technologies of China which the NDMA has reconfigured for compatibility with the local fibre network.
The collaboration between the University and NDMA also includes some key synergies at the Ministry’s Centre of Excellence in Information Technology (CEIT), which is located on the Turkeyen Campus. The parties have committed to sharing research, instructional skills and materials. The CEIT is funded by the Government of India.
For the Ministry of Public Telecommunications, this is a key element in its national ICT initiative, which has education as its main pillar. From the University’s platform, the Administration is gearing to achieve optimal delivery of tertiary level tutelage by upgrading the physical and technological infrastructure and Guyana’s human capital.
The MOU is expected to be signed by Minister Catherine Hughes and Vice Chancellor Professor Dr Ivelaw Griffith by the end of April 2017.