The University of Lagos Muslim Communoty has celebrated the varsity’s overall best graduating students of the 2018/2019 academic session, Alimi Ibrahim Adedeji, who had a CGPA of 4.98 and student with overall best PhD thesis Dr. Moruf Rasheed, and others who bagged first class.
A total of 281 graduands bag first class during the 51st convocation ceremonies at the University of Lagos.
The Chairman of University of Lagos Muslim Community (UMC), Prof. Lai Olurode, commended the students of the institution who made first class in the last academic section.
“I celebrate all the students who made first class not because they are Muslims or Christians but because they are the best. I suggest others should emulate them.
“ They should be a model for the younger ones and come back to the university for mentorship of others. They must learn to circulate knowledge, they must learn to give back to the society, especially to University of Lagos where they graduated,”
Staff Adviser of the Muslim Students’ Society of Nigeria (MSSN), University of Lagos Branch, Dr. Khalid Adekoya, said he is very glad with the brilliant performance of Muslim students who bagged first class honours degree during the last academic session of the institution.
Adekoya attributed their excellent performance to the grace of Almighty Allah that crowned their efforts at MSSN with success, noting that the development is also an indication that MSSN members lead in the university.
“We give glory to God Almighty for crowning our little efforts with this success. We based all our efforts on what God has guided us to do. We made sure that we encouraged the students, especially those of them that are good, to organise tutorials in the mosque alongside other Islamic teachings. We have specific lectures for different courses, especially the difficult ones to encourage those who are not doing too well to wake up.”
The owner overall best Ph.D. thesis, Dr. Moruf Rasheed said, he is so excited because he had no premonition to win the laurel at the start of the research work, but decided to get the best out of everything he laid his hands on.
According to him: “Being the best makes one the number one but being unique makes one the only one. Each person knows his or her own place for water (Q 2:6).
“With respect to what I have done within the three years of my fulltime Ph.D. research leading to 12 extracted published papers in both international and national journals, I then realised it is an award well-deserved. I thank God Almighty for this honour, knowing that many of my colleagues also had good contributions to knowledge.”
Overall UNILAG best graduating student, Alimi Ibraheem said, it was great to emerge as UNILAG best graduating student.
“My parents and extended family thought I was going to study Medicine due to my smartness.
“I knew I couldn’t cope with medicine due to my fear of blood, mutilated bodies, human parts, and all the situations doctors face. My next option was engineering because growing up, I loved cars and had a dream of building my own car and I also love Mathematics. So, Mechanical Engineering felt like the perfect choice.
“My five years experience in the University had its moments, the good and bad ones. Mechanical Engineering itself was very demanding and stressful right from the onset. The rigorous and voluminous lab reports are an important highlight. I was able to make new friends and families, further extending my connections.”
First class in Marine Sciences Depts graduate Labeebah Dhikrullah, daughter of popular Islamic scholar, Sheikh Dhikrullah said being the third best in her department gave her joy.
“First, it’s Allah that made it possible. I am grateful to Him for seeing me through with a good result, Alhamdulillah. Being the third best gives me internal joy. For someone like me, I didn’t have a first-class GP in my year one but I saw the need to buckle up.
“ I set a target of 5.0 for myself every semester. There are some semesters where I did well and some I didn’t. For every heartbeat before checking my result, to all kinds of emotions after checking it, I say Alhamdulillah. Sometimes I do feel discouraged about having a first class, but my mentor always encouraged and motivated me not to give up and always prayed to Allah for strength. I’m grateful. After seeing my final results, I was happy. Another thing that gave me joy was that, out of five first class graduates in my department, four of us are Muslims. It was a prayer that came true and I’m very grateful to Allah and to everyone that was part of my success story.”
