Hadiza’s traverse at Nasarawa State University

By Barakah Ismail

Secondary school leavers who are resident in Nasarawa, Abuja, Benue and the environs, who desire university education, need not worry as the Nasarawa State University has a wide range of academic and professional courses for their benefits.
Founded in 2002, the university is a public higher institution located in the large town of Keffi with population of about 249,999.
The school is accredited by the National Universities Commission, Nigeria (NUC).
Nasarawa State University or NSU as popularly called by students offers courses and programmes leading to award of degrees in several areas of study.
It has faculties of Administration, Agriculture, Arts, Education, Law, Natural and Applied Sciences and the School of Post Graduate Studies.
NSU also has several academic and non-academic facilities and services to buttress essence of education. These are library, hostel and clinic with first aid as well as sporting facilities.
Being a young university, the institution is doing its best to impact knowledge and moral discipline on its students, producing among other Nigerians, best graduates with credible results and self confidence with character and learning.
Courses, levels and areas of studies include the diploma, long vacation training (LVT) and part time programmes.

Hadiza Usman, having spent six months at home awaiting JAMB results, finally found solace at the Nasarawa State University. She started her tertiary education journey in December 2012.
At exactly 7pm on January 2, she received a call from her brother congratulating her that she was among the lucky ones to have gained admission into the university.
She was filled with joy that night and she quickly ran to the parent to give them the good news that registration was to commence on January 7.
Unfortunately, Hadiza fell sick and could not report on January 7 until 15th, although she was able to complete her departmental and faculty registrations.
Having completed her registration, she went for a hostel space which a form was given to her to fill and submitted. While she was waiting for the names to be out, she was shuttling from town to the school which was very stressful. After a week the names of those given accommodation was out and Hadiza was so excited to be among. The school environment was quite big with various faculties and departments.
Lectures began a week later and although she was fresh from secondary school, Hadiza was anxious to attend her first lecture in the university, despite the fact that it was an introductory class with about 40 students.

Within two weeks, the lecture hall was filled to capacity such that to properly hear what the lecturer was saying, became a challenge and in order to overcome that, she had to re-order her schedule in order to adapt to the new system which wasn’t easy. Hadiza started going for lecture an hour before the lecture time to be able sit in front and hear what the lecturer is saying.
Adapting to a new environment, meeting new friends and sharing a room with ‘strangers’ didn’t really go well with her, but that is part of education and what tertiary education is all about.
In view of the number of students in each hostel, she had no time to read during the day and even at night due to the stress of trekking from the hostel to lecture hall under the scorching sun and her room mates wouldn’t let her read because of noise. The school area is always noisy with music everywhere because of the party organised for new students; there were lots of social activities going on in the school.

It could be recalled that Hadezia’s first Friday was so amazing because at around 12pm, the Muslims went for the Muslims Students Society (MSS) while the Christians went for their fellowships.
The religious spirit was quiet high among the students of both faiths and they all cohabited, peacefully. There was also cultural and ethnic unity among the student in such a way that everybody tried to portray good image of their origin. Each student was given the school manual to guide on the dos and don’ts of the school.
Hadiza was cautious of the kind of people she was moving around with, knowing well that she “can’t do anything that will jeopardise her reason for being in school and her families’ expectations”.
“My first semester result wasn’t really impressive, so I had to tighten up my belt. But praise God! With hard work and prayers I began to excel in my studies.
“I studied with friends and tried to help ourselves. Unlike some students, who know nothing order than to party and engage in all sorts of social activities, our senior colleagues used to advice us on how to behave on campus”, Hadiza said.
One unforgettable advice Hadiza often give to her friends was the need to study hard and she never restricted herself to what the lecturer teaches in the class.