Delta goes to school – The Sun Nigeria

The the old Midwest region, later the state of Bendel, was a foundry of academic and sporting excellence. And when on that brilliant August 27, 1991, it was split into Delta and Edo parts, the Delta part left an alliance of a strong expressive difference in the gene in sports and researchers.

But the state began to lose its splendor and majesty in both areas as the army penetrated deeper into the governance structure. It was reflected in a gradual decline in the ranking of states in the national academic index. The elementary and high school sporting events that marked the activities in old Bendel began to fade to the horizon. Grassroots sports competitions were not only considered a serious part of the school year, but they defined the customs and norms of young people in ancient times.

At St. Anthonys College, Ubulu-Uku (my alma mater), old schoolboys are still full of nostalgia. They remember those great moments when the school almost arrogantly published one of the best results in the WAEC exams. They experience moments of large and rough attacks by students in football, table tennis, sprints and high jumps. The motto of the school: Emerge Et Adefica (rise and build in Latin) was the battle cry of the students. It was the filling that drove their rotor performance. They rose, built, shone.

The school, founded by the Catholic Embassy in 1956, was scored, as in the WAEC tests for some students. As early as 1969, obtaining an A grade in all subjects, especially among science students, was the norm. It was generally 100% passed in the so-called Almighty WAEC exam. Yes, the WAEC exam was feared and even marked omnipotent in some schools, but never so in St. Anthony. Just as it succeeded in scientists, so did it in sports. In 1969, it won the Midwest Football Award for High Schools and won Edo College at the popular Ogbe Stadium in Benin City. St. Anthonys students rose the best in the state at various times.

But the same St. Anthonys College collapsed over the years. It got worse after Delta and Edo went in different directions: the result of a military misunderstanding. Even the rebirth of democracy could not get the education sector of states out of rot. My old school changed from majesty to miasma. The sports facilities that made it easier for schools rose to stardom, ceased to deteriorate. The buildings collapsed. The ceilings fell under the stress of the elements. Dormitories became landfills. And gradually but steadily, Bendel’s glory receded to Delta’s shame.

The degenerating bull of education raged in the Delta. Someone has to tame it. Governor Ifeanyi Okowa has stepped out to defeat the beast. Will he become a matador? The champion of this bullfight? Training in Delta requires a complete reset. Complete return to default excellence and spotless quality. Okowa, a product of the Nigerian public school system itself (Edo College, Benin and Ibadan), must be concerned. Of course he is worried. And he never hid his aversion to slipping and declining quality education. He expressed concern about the sad reality that too many Deltaians are chasing too few entry points in colleges. The exceptionally brilliant deltas have been denied access to universities and Unity schools across the country because their quotas were filled before they even enrolled in the entrance exam or because they do not belong to the catchment area of ​​these universities and polytechnics. How do you explain that out of the 25,000 Delta residents who applied to enter the university in 2020, more than 20,000 were qualified, but only 4,000 were admitted, while in some states, university access gates are opened to both qualified and non-qualified.

He apologized for the lack of technical skills among young people. The old technical colleges that produced City and Guild certified technicians in the good old days have become shadows of their old glory. But Deltaians love school. They are famous for always looking for information. At home and offshore, Deltans has hugged headlines for his anomalous performances in education. They are excellent in medicine, law, science and the liberal arts, as well as in almost all human endeavors. Deltans dominate the sport. And this explains people’s republicanism. No one is a slave to intolerable slavery. Every Delta, young or old, is a sophisticated, sure-footed creature; brave, street intelligent and literate. The educated mind is the liberated mind. Delta describes it. The truth is, the average Delta child just wants a good education, including technical education. But the quota and the slight neglect of the industry have taken away many opportunities. Okowa is reshaping the ecosystem. The governor brings back the brilliant, old order.

There is a deliberate policy to ensure that all school-age deltas fall within the framework of National Education Policy (NPE), United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) and Universal Basic Education (UBE) parameters. . This paradigm shift has sparked young people’s interest in technical and vocational education, and enrollment has increased by more than 150 per cent since 2015. The good 12 vocational centers and five recently approved centers are a combination of skills and technical capacity developers that produce tailor-made men and women to create wealth and create jobs instead of being job seekers.

Birth of three universities, namely the University of Delta, Agbor; Dennis Osadebay University, Anwai and the University of Science and Technology, Ozoro through state laws satisfy Deltan’s Hunger University teaching. There are possibly nine universities in the state, four public and five private; four polytechnics (two public and two private); seven nursing / health technology schools; two educational institutions; 1510 high schools (474 ​​public and 1036 private). But the emphasis is not on planting schools. It is the dissemination of technology and quality to the school system. It builds the whole person: mentally, physically and spiritually.

Nelson Mandela once described training as the most effective weapon you can use to change the world. It goes without saying. Great leaders have liberated their people by exposing them to vaults of knowledge, not giving them money, first-class tokenism. Okowa consciously invests in quality and technical education as a tool to equip people and prepare for tomorrow’s demands. Those who laugh and laugh at childbirthToo many schools should check the decline in the number of out-of-school children in some Nigerian states. It is a dangerous proposal to ignore people’s search for information. Certainly, if that longing is not saturated, they will direct their energy elsewhere, usually on the path of negativity. Okowa has taken Delta back to school because he doesn’t think he’ll give Delta a fish that would last a moment; he teaches them fishing only so that they may receive food throughout their lives (apologies to the Jewish philosopher Moses ben Maimon, aka Maimonides).