Greenville, NC – East Carolina University professor Victor Mbarika has been honored with a rare Lifetime Achievement Award by US President Joe Biden, a distinguished honor bestowed to those who have demonstrated a lifetime of service.
“I am extremely honored and humbled to be presented with this distinguished award by the president,” Professor Mbarika said. “I have worked hard to devote my life and career to highlighting and supporting global initiatives that have helped to lift those in poverty. It is my continuing vision to highlight these programs and bring them into the public consciousness.”
The award is granted by the president to individuals who contribute more than 4,000 hours of service in their lifetime. Along with the ultimate honor of presidential recognition, recipients receive a personalized certificate, an official pin, medallion or coin and a congratulatory letter from the president.
The award will be presented to Mbarika during a special ceremony held at the White House later this year. He was also recently honored from the United Kingdom’s House of Lords with the African Leadership Award, an honor previously bestowed upon the likes of African leaders Nelson Mandela, Kofi Anan and Julius Nyerere. Mbarika is the only academic in North Carolina known to hold both awards.
He is the Stallings Distinguished International Scholar professor at East Carolina University, in Greenville, North Carolina.
Mbarika is also the founder and president of The Information and Communication Technology University (ICT University), which has multiple campuses in developing countries. Through his leadership as President and Board of Trustees, ICT University was named the best University in Cameroon and best digital University in Central Africa. As a philanthropist, he has funded multiple ICT projects and scholarships worldwide.
In addition to focusing his efforts abroad, Mbarika has also committed to highlighting global issues and scholarship, particularly in Africa and Europe, and bringing those issues to North Carolina. Much of his research focuses on technology usage in resource-poor settings.
He is founder of the International Center for Information Technology and Development. Prof. Mbarika serves (or has served) as Visiting Professor at several universities worldwide and is currently the Visiting Leo Endowed Professor and Visiting Legacy Endowed Chair at Legacy University. And he is an ICT consultant and holds a BSc in Management Information Systems from the U.S. International University, a MSc in MIS from the University of Illinois at Chicago, and Ph.D. in MIS from Auburn University, USA. He completed his BSc, MSc, and Ph.D., all in five years.
Prof. Mbarika is recipient of three Lifetime Achievement Awards in higher education. He has authored over 250 academic publications in the form of books, peer reviewed journals, conference proceedings and book chapters.
Prof. Mbarika received a Fulbright grant five times to mentor scholars from developing nations. He is Founding Editor-in-Chief of The African Journal of Information Systems and senior board member of several journals. Prof. Mbarika is a Lifetime Member of the Beta Gamma Sigma Honor Society. He is a member of several academic associations, including Africa’s first distinguished member of the Association of Information Systems.
*Source WNCT
