History of Ignatius Ajuru University of Education (IAUE)
Ignatius Ajuru University of Education (IAUE), located in Port Harcourt, Rivers State, Nigeria, is a public institution established to address the acute shortage of trained teachers following the Nigerian Civil War. The university’s origins trace back to June 14, 1971, when it was founded as the Advanced Teachers’ Training College under the leadership of Dr. William Maxwell Jnr., a USAID representative serving in Rivers State at the time.
In 1975, the institution was upgraded to the Rivers State College of Education through the promulgation of Edict No. 1 on February 25. Mr. Emmanuel Aguma was appointed as the first Provost of the newly established college.
The college held its first graduation ceremony on March 11, 1978, awarding the Nigeria Certificate in Education (NCE) to 462 students. In 1982, it admitted its first candidates for the Bachelor of Education degree program in affiliation with the University of Ibadan, becoming the only college among those affiliated with the university to offer this degree.
To fulfill the vision of becoming an autonomous degree-awarding institution, the Rivers State Government passed the University of Education Law No. 8 of 2009, leading to the establishment of the Ignatius Ajuru University of Education on October 20, 2009. The university was named in honor of the late Ambassador Ignatius Ajuru, a former Chairman of the institution’s Governing Council, who played a pivotal role in its transformation.
IAUE currently operates three campuses: the main campus at Rumuolumeni, and additional campuses at St. John’s Diobu and Ndele. The university comprises seven faculties: Agriculture, Education, Humanities, Management Sciences, Natural and Applied Sciences, Social Sciences, and Vocational and Technical Education.
