Vice Chancellor of Sheffield Hallam University visits SLIIT

Friday, 14 March 2014 06:22 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}

Marks first visit to a partner institute in South Asia Vice-Chancellor of Sheffield Hallam University Professor Philip Jones recently visited a partner institute to confer degrees for the first time, honouring the Sri Lanka Institute of Information Technology (SLIIT) by his presence at its 12th annual convocation on 28 February. “As a visitor, it is a pleasure to see all these smiling, happy faces, making this visit truly worthwhile. It gives me pride to see how the collaboration between Sheffield Hallam University (SHU) and SLIIT has borne fruit, with new study courses being introduced in the near future,” Professor Jones said.

At present, students can complete the BBA (Hons) Degree in Business Management and the BEng (Hons) degree in Electronic Engineering from SHU at SLIIT, thanks to the partnership between the two institutes. Sheffield Hallam University is a leading university in the UK, with a student population of over 37,000 students. SHU and SLIIT have been in an academic partnership since the year 2006. There are over 1,000 Sri Lankan SHU alumni, and 700 of these students have either followed SHU degrees at SLIIT or have transferred to SHU from SLIIT under their summer top-up programme. “It is an honour to receive a visit from the Vice-Chancellor of SHU himself, which is testament to the cordial relationship between our two educational institutes,” said President/CEO of SLIIT, Professor Lalith Gamage. “Each year, we build on this relationship by introducing new courses in partnership with SHU, and this year is no exception.” This year, the BSc (Hons) Software Engineering of SHU will be introduced. This is a three-year SHU degree which can be completed at SLIIT. Apart from this, SHU academic staff also pay regular visits to SLIIT, ensuring the quality of the programmes on offer. During his visit to Sri Lanka, Professor Jones also attended a special networking event for SHU alumni, held 28 February at the Cinnamon Grand. The event was an opportunity for Sri Lankan alumni of Sheffield Hallam undergraduate, postgraduate and PhD study to meet and talk with senior university staff. Sheffield Hallam staff who attended the event apart from Professor Jones included Professor Terence Perera, Assistant Dean of Academic Resources, James Richardson, Director of International Development, Stephen Lofthouse, SAP Programme Manager & Senior Lecturer in Business Computing & SAP, Neil Richardson, a Senior Lecturer in the Arts, Computing Engineering and Sciences faculty, Anita Sandham, International Marketing Manager and Sudha Toppo, the South Asia Office Regional Coordinator. Shortly after Professor Jones’ visit, the Capture the Hacker competition was officially launched by Sheffield Hallam University at a public lecture held at SLIIT Malabe campus by course leader Neil Richardson. A workshop on ethical hacking for SLIIT computer systems and networking students was also held in conjunction with this event. The winner of the Capture the Hacker competition will receive a full-fee scholarship to study MSc Information Systems Security in the UK in September 2014.