Ignatius Ajuru University of Education started as Advanced Teachers’ Training College on 14th June 1971 under the headship of Dr William Maxwell Jnr., a USAID representative who served in Rivers State.

The College was established out of the need to check the acute shortage of trained teachers for the rapidly expanding programmes of post-primary education in Rivers State after the civil war in 1970.

However, it was upgraded to Rivers State College of Education in 1975 following the promulgation of Edict No 1 on  25th February 1975. Following this transformation, Mr Emmanuel Aguma, who was appointed Principal in January 1975 became the first Provost of the new College.

The College had its first graduation ceremony on 11th March 1978 where four sets of students totalling 462 received the Nigeria Certificate in Education.

In1982, the College admitted the first candidates for the Bachelor of Education degree programme in affiliation with the University of Ibadan.

It is noteworthy that of all the Colleges of Education affiliated with the University of Ibadan, the then Rivers State College of Education was the only one that offered the Bachelor of Education degree programme.

However, to actualise the vision of the founding fathers of the College to become an autonomous degree-awarding institution, it was again upgraded to a University following the passage of the University of Education Law No. 8 of 2009 by the Rivers State House of Assembly on 15 October 2009.

The official pronouncement was made on October 20, 2009, by His Excellency, Rotimi Chibike Amaechi, the governor of Rivers State, but was renamed Ignatius Ajuru University of Education in 2010 in honour of the late Ambassador Ignatius Ajuru, a one-time Chairman of the institution’s Governing Council, who championed the upgrading of the College to a University.

The institution is the thirty-fifth (35th) state-owned University in Nigeria.

The University has three campuses located in Rumuolumeni (the main campus and seat of administration), St John Diobu campus, and Ndele campus in Obio/Akpor, Port Harcourt, and Emuoha Local Government Areas respectively.

Currently, the University has seven Faculties. They are the Faculty of Agriculture, Faculty of Education, Faculty of Humanities, Faculty of Management Sciences, Faculty of Natural and Applied Sciences, Faculty of Social Sciences and Faculty of Vocational and Technical Education.

There are fifty (50) teaching departments, seventy-four (74) Professors, and other teaching staff.

The majority of the Programmes of the institution are fully accredited by the National Universities Commission (NUC), Nigeria’s Universities regulatory body.

This was made possible by the Visitor to the University and the Rivers State Governor, His Excellency, Barrister Nyesom Ezenwo Wike, whose love for youth development and quality education is unquestionable.