Promise Okwor, a school drop-out, impregnated out of wedlock, and who later began to work in a table water factory, scored 210 in the 2024 Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME) for the concerted training given to her.
According to Alex Onyia, the chief executive officer at Educare, who narrated the story on his official X handle @winexviv the young girl was abandoned to fate because of her predicament and had her work hours at the table water factory usually at night.
“We had this young little girl who got pregnant out of wedlock in my village. Her family abandoned her and her formal education was terminated.
She started working in a pure water factory. Her shift is usually at night,” he said.
“When she heard about our JAMB prep programme, she decided to give education another shot. She had to be joining the lessons from work every morning and return to work every evening. On CBT days she does the same thing,” Onyia added.
Okwor, who sat for the 2024 UTME with registration number 202441453642DF made the following scores; English Language 58, Government 47, English Literature 53, and Christian Religious Studies 52, cumulating to a total score of 210.
The founder of Educare, a leading software firm described the young girl’s determination to make amends for her errors as second to none; and promised to ensure she gets her education drive back on track.
“We will ensure she gets into school,” he said.
Mfon Ekpo-umo, an X user with official handle @ekpoumomfon, commended Onyia and his team’s efforts to launch youngsters in his community back to school.
“This is bold. May God help her put the pieces of her life together. With this proven determination, she’ll go places. All she needs is continued persistence with God on her side. All those who abandoned her including the irresponsible goal scorer, will seek after her,” she tweeted.
P.A.T.I.T.O. @Pato9ja decried the fate of the female folks in the African continent where girls are not usually given the space to thrive.
“This is one thing that I know has continued to ruin the future of young African girls.
“African society rarely gives young women a second chance, but we all have had a second chance at some point in our journey of life. African girls deserve a second chance!” he tweeted.
Onyia had earlier shared how he and his team invested in education when he disclosed that they resolved to invest in the learning of the youngsters in his community by paying for their JAMB registration fees, and also offering full scholarships to everyone who scores 300 and above.
Besides, they established a project in 2023 to address mass failure in UTME among youngsters in his community.
“Last JAMB was a disaster for my village youngsters. Over 70 per cent of them failed UTME, and the rest sparely passed. Rather than waiting for the government, we decided to take a different approach.
“We took the challenge upon ourselves for it not to repeat itself again. Every youngster in my village right now is on an intensive morning and evening drilling for next year’s JAMB, and they undertake Computer-Based Test (CBT) once monthly with a large pool of 16 years past questions across different subjects,” he said.
To achieve the expected goal, he explained that the CBT classes tracked the students’ performances on different topics and emphasised their weaknesses across different subject topics.
One common thing noticed, according to Onyia is that many of the youngsters were alien to computers and could not even use a mouse not to talk of keyboards.
This very noticeable weakness made him wonder how these students were going to succeed in JAMB when they were probably using a computer for the first time on a UTME day.
Hence, they resolved to invest in the education of the young ones in their community by paying for their JAMB registration fees and also offering full scholarships to everyone who scores 300 and above.
“The biggest challenge was that most of the students did not know how to use a computer. It’s an eye opener and our mission is for all of them to score above 250,” he said.
