University of Guyana

History

Cheddi Jagan, then Premier of British Guiana, considered that the University of the West Indies, to which his government had contributed since 1948, was not meeting the demand of his countrymen for higher education. On 4 January 1962, Jagan wrote to Harold Drayton, then in Ghana, to ask him to seek the advice of W.E.B. Du Bois on starting a new university.

Drayton returned to British Guiana in December 1962, and it was on his advice that Jagan wrote to socialist scholars in the United Kingdom and United States, including Joan Robinson at the University of Cambridge, Paul Baran at Stanford University, and Lancelot Hogben at Birmingham to involve them in the recruitment of staff.

The University opened on the grounds of Queen's College in late 1963. Its first chancellor was Edgar Mortimer Duke and its first Principal and Vice-Chancellor was the British biologist and mathematician Lancelot Hogben.

Organisation and structure

The university is divided into a number of faculties:

School of Earth and Environmental Sciences

Director - Shanomae RoseCoordinator - Linda Johnson-Bhola

Faculty of Natural Sciences

Dean - Calvin BernardAssistant Dean - Kesha Holder

Faculty of Social Sciences

Dean - Paloma MohommedAssistant Dean - Sharon Roopchand Edwards

School of Education and Humanities

Dean - Claudette AustinDeputy Dean - Bonita Hunter

Faculty of Health Sciences

Dean - Emanuel CummingsAssistant Dean - Davon Van-VeenDirector - Madan Rambaran

Faculty of Technology

Dean - Verlyn KlassAssistant Dean - Elena Trim

Institute of Distance and Continuing Education

Faculty of Agriculture and Forestry

It also contains the Institute of Distance and Continuing Education.

Alumni

Mahadai Das, Guyanese writer

M. Jamal Deen, FRSC FCAE FINAE, Professor and Senior Canada Research Chair, McMaster University, Canada

Odeen Ishmael, Guyanese ambassador Venezuela, formerly to the United States and the Organization of American States

Denis Williams, Guyanese painter and archaeologist

Neil Pierre, Director of Policy Coordination Branch, United Nations

Faculty and administrators

Prem Misir, Pro-Chancellor and Professor in Public Health

Joyce Sparer Adler, American critic, playwright, and teacher, as well as a founding faculty of the University in 1963

Joel Benjamin, former deputy Librarian and archivist at the University

Derek Bickerton, former lecturer, now Professor Emeritus of Linguistics at University of Hawai'i, Honolulu

Janette Bulkan, Guyanese professor and activist of international environmental human rights; visiting professor at Colby College

Harold Drayton, key advisor to Jagan on the founding of the university, Guyanese scientist, former Deputy-Principal and Professor of Biology

Michael Gilkes, Guyanese writer and academic

Stanley Greaves, Guyanese painter, former head of Creative Arts at the University

Richard Hart, Jamaican lawyer and politician

Lancelot Hogben, English zoologist and geneticist

Abdur Rahman Slade Hopkinson, Guyanese writer and professor at the University (1966–68)

Basdeo Mangru, Guyanese historian; current faculty of City University of New York, York

Ali Mazrui, African and Islamic studies academic

Dr Mark Pelling, Reader in Human Geography, King's College, London

Marie Philipneri, M.D., M.P.H. Associate Professor of Internal Medicine, Director of Outpatient Dialysis Program, Saint Louis University School of Medicine

Clem Seecharan, Guyanese writer

Bertrand Ramcharan, current Channcellor of the University

Shridath Ramphal, former Guyanese foreign minister (1972–75) and the second Commonwealth Secreteary General (1975–90)

Walter Rodney, Pan-African writer and political theorist

Rupert Roopnaraine, Guyanese writer, politician and academic

Dr Joycelyn Loncke, Guyanese Linguist, teacher of French Language.