Last week, the Founder of the American University of Nigeria (AUN), Atiku Abubakar announced the reappointment of Margee Ensign as president/vice-chancellor, with effect from June 1, 2021.
The development must have excited not only the university environment, but also the host community. The reason is simple.
Ensign was very charismatic in her first coming at AUN. A gregarious administrator, with who there’s no dull moment. She touched lives and took AUN to the world stage.
She demonstrated that to succeed as a leader of an institution of AUN standing, there is the need to carry the media along as not doing so would amount to winking in the dark.
She perfectly worked with a thoroughbred University of Nigeria Nsukka (UNN)-baked communication expert, Dan Okereke whose rapport with the media helped AUN a great deal.
Ensign was not just a president of the university environment; she reached out to the host community, to the point that she floated a programme tagged, ‘Feed and Read’ for the Almajiri population in Yola.
The programme provides basic preparatory education to Almajiri youngsters in the community. The platform allows them to learn basic English, mathematics, hygiene, and social skills.
She also encouraged the natives, particularly the womenfolk, to learn handcrafts, and provided the opportunity for them to do so.
Ensign had first served as president of AUN from 2010 to 2017 before departing to take up the presidency at Dickinson College, one of the oldest and most distinguished liberal arts colleges in the United States.
But on May 14, 2021, she announced her resignation as president of Dickinson.
A release from AUN a few days ago announcing her come back, said that Senator Ben Obi, chairman of AUN’s Governing Council, had said the Board and Council were fully confident that Ensign had the “very best credentials and experience to lead the University through this critical stage in its development and pledged their unstinting support for her success.”
Welcoming Ensign back to Yola, Atiku, a former Nigerian vice president, described the decision to ask Ensign to return to the AUN presidency as “one of the easiest in recent times,” in order that she might, “continue the excellent work that you have started at AUN.”
He was quoted to have charged Ensign with re-launching and achieving the bold strategic plan she developed for the University in her first seven year tenure, which aimed at building on the American style of pedagogy using the latest technology—including a superb new digital library- to train a new generation of African leaders, and to find solutions to the crucial economic and social challenges besetting Africa.
Atiku also challenged the returning president to reposition the University and intensify the recruitment of the brightest and best students from all over Nigeria and across Africa, students inspired by the call to leadership and service.
“Your return to Yola must bring back those creative community outreaches that enabled our institution to impact so greatly not only on the Yola community but across the country and the world.
“I remember, with a combination of pride and humility, how you mobilised the Yola Community and personally led the fight for the continued education of the abducted Chibok girls. You opened the AUN campus, first to those Chibok girls that escaped the onslaught of Boko Haram, and eventually to those few that were freed in 2016. You will be reuniting with some of this determined generation of young women who have continued to pursue their education dreams at AUN”, Atiku said.
It was under Ensign’s first tenure that AUN transformed itself into a pioneering and innovative Development University. She invested exceptional energy in promoting academic research while deepening entrepreneurship and hands-on leadership training as an essential component of AUN students’ learning experience.
By empowering the academic support systems on campus – the Mathematics Resource Centre, the Writing Centre, and the Student Advising and Retention Centre – and strengthening the University’s connections with the Global Liberal Arts Alliance of universities, AUN students partook in exchange programmes in universities in the US, the UK and Asia. Students of AUN made an outstanding impact in major global forums, scooping awards at the annual Model United Nations Conference in New York, the Facebook Challenge and the campus Hult Prize competition.
In 2015, the American University of Paris honored Ensign with a causa honoris for successfully aligning the development mission and core values of the American University to the specific needs of Adamawa State. President Ensign was cited for her leadership role in using education to promote peace, community development, and empowerment through a local platform, the Adamawa Peace Initiative (API) which she chaired as it took on a leading role in helping the many hundreds of thousands of refugees fleeing Boko Haram.
In the same year, the Adamawa State Women’s wing of the Jama’atulNasril Islam in Nigeria (JNI) conferred an award to honor her contributions to leadership, philanthropy, and the education of women and girls in northeast Nigeria.
The entire AUN community joins with His Excellency, Atiku Abubakar, who wrote: “I feel most profoundly honoured to welcome you back to the American University of Nigeria, Yola, your home away from home.”
Ensign was born in 1954. She earned her BA from New College of Florida, and her PhD in International Political Economy from the University of Maryland University College. She began her administrative career at Columbia University in New York City. There she combined roles of Professor of Politics and Economy with director of the International Political Economy Program.
Ensign came to AUN from the University of the Pacific in California where she was Dean of the School of International Studies and Associate Provost for International Initiatives. She set up undergraduate and graduate programs in social entrepreneurship, Inter-American Studies, and intercultural relations. She also oversaw the Gerber Lecture Series that attracted speakers such as Archbishop (emeritus) Desmund Tutu of South Africa, President Paul Kagame of Rwanda, Vice-President Gilbert Bukenya of Uganda, President César Gaviria of Colombia, and Prime Minister Gro Harlem Brundtland of Norway.
Ensign is a scholar whose works focus on international development and the implications of development assistance.
Indeed, her return to the University will not only excite the students and staff, but also the down-trodden indigenes, on the street of Yola.
