Students at Mount Kenya University Rwanda in the health department have received new lab equipment that will help them during their learning, research and collaborative practices. The equipment that was unveiled on July 11 at the Mount Kenya University Rwanda campus in Kagarama Sector in Kicukiro District by the university founder, Prof Simon Gicharu. Gicharu handed the equipment to the university administration. Dr. Consolata Mureithi giving a speech during the handover ceremony The equipment will help train students doing nursing in safe delivery of babies and will also help them carry out research on different types of sicknesses. MKU Rwanda vice chancellor Prof. Edwin Odhuno while receiving the equipment from the founder pointed that the equipment will be fully utilized in teaching/learning, research and collaborative projects. He went on to say that among the strategies of the university’s 10 year-programme that started in 2016 and runs up to 2024 includes continuous adding of teaching equipment to help students in practical learning. Dr. Consolata Mureithi giving a speech during the handover ceremony “We realised that without these equipment, students cannot be able to get hands on skills that are required during their training so as management team, we decided to invest $200,000 to buy the equipment,” said Odhuno. According to Dr. Consolata Mureithi who was among those who travelled to the USA to outsource the equipment, it is imperative for health students at university to have the latest and high quality science lab supplies these days. Some of the expensive equipment that was handed over (pics by Joseph Mudingu) Science is different from any other subject and in order to understand its concepts, one has to look beyond the books and conventional classroom teaching. “Effective teaching and learning of science involves seeing, handling, and manipulating real objects and materials. The knowledge that students attain in lecture rooms would be ineffectual unless they actually observe the process and understand the relationship between action and reaction” said Mureith. According to Modeste Mfitumukiza, a student in the school of health at MKU, the equipment is going to help them acquire practical skills that they can’t get in lecture rooms. “It is hard to practice on a real patient even after one has acquired the necessary theoretical skills. There is always the fear of making mistakes or hurting the patient while treating broken bones and other injuries. But with these dummies, we can learn better and later apply our skills on real patients” says Modeste Mount Kenya University (MKU) is a fully fledged chartered university committed to a broad-based, wholistic and inclusive system of education. It has an overall goal of promoting human resource development for society’s progressive good.
