…As PTA chairman says there’s job for hardworking students
Two major revelations emerged in Port Harcourt when one of the topmost schools, Showers International School, marked its awards at the British Council exams plus 2024 graduation.
First was when Anthony Akpan, a retired oil engineer and chairman of the school, revealed that the new strategy is not just about exquisite buildings, world class classrooms, highflying teachers, and arrays of computers, but a mechanism that allows the school owner and teachers to penetrate the minds and hearts of each student and achieve one on one relations. He said the head of the school must find a strategy to know each student one by one. He said that is the secret of Showers.
He said this makes the students to accept the teachers or proprietors as worthy of their confidence.
Else, Akpan said, the school would once in a while experience turbulence and produce students that could become maladjusted and terrorise the society or be negative influence in the society. Some, he said, would find it difficult.
He said: “Large school populations make students unknown to teachers. Key of success at Showers is knowing the children one by one. Any school that does not know each child would run into trouble because children these can hide a lot from their teachers and parents.”
He said the students in Showers know that they are known one by one by the teachers and topmost management; their strengths and weaknesses.
“Those who want to run schools must add this to their strengths, else, they produce terrible students. They must strive to know every child. It creates much bonding needed to track each child psychologically. It makes a whole lot of difference.”
The second was when Isaac Okpako Okechukwu, chairman of the parent-teachers association (PTA), stated that jobs were available after school. He told the school audience that they students should not believe that there were no jobs after school.
He said hard work is the key for everything.
He affirmed that it was so in Showers. He said it was the reason most parents kept bringing child after child to the place.
Okechukwu said: “The teachers here handle the students one by one. That’s is why most of us are still here. Their results show it.”
To the graduands, he said: “Your race starts now. Work is there. Read hard, pass well, good jobs await you.”
He went on: “There is work for those who worked hard in school. Don’t believe what they tell you that there is no work.”
He advised them not to consider fraud (yahoo) as a career, saying the special agencies of government would be waiting. “In the university, you will guide yourself. Studies are bigger there. Your siblings are watching you.”
In his keynote address, Athan Amasiatu, a professor of sports and exercise psychology at the University of Port Harcourt, who is currently the Director of the Centre for Higher Education (CHES) at the university, spoke on sustaining success.
He showed how to achieve success and how to sustain it, saying success lasts for years, not moments.
“So, work hard, work harder to reach target, recoup (rest) and achieve sustainable success. Working too hard for too long will lead to collapse. The way to do it is to recuperate, rest, and bounce back.”
He described man as what happens to a person in the morning of his life, afternoon, and night.
He gave nuggets: Key to sustainable success is creating more successful events day and night. Goal setting is important; discover purpose, carry out continuous learning because the day you stop learning, you start dyeing. Take time out, achieve emotional maturity.
WAEC reveals a lot:
An official of the West African Examinations Council (WAEC) made rare appearance at a school’s graduation.
John Zakka, the zonal head, spoke on hard work by schools. He however explained why he put up the rare appearance.
His words: “I must congratulate the graduands. The last time I was to be here, I could not make it and I had to send a representative. Despite tight schedule this time around, I managed to come. Why did I come? I am here because of the proprietress of this school (Ekama Emilia Akpan).
“How did I know her? She came to see me in the office one day but did not meet me. She eventually left but dropped her card. In it, she said my former boss sent her to me. I called my boss to say such a woman came to see me and said you sent her to me.
“It was then that my boss, whom I respect so much, told me what WAEC knew about Mrs Emilia Akpan; that she once came and reported to WAEC to cancel her school’s result, that she found out that her students did something funny during the exams of that year.
“Can you imagine? A proprietor coming to report her school to WAEC? Other schools pamper examination officers but here, this one does not do like that. Most other schools want to make name for their schools with results.”
He said it means people in this school (Showers) produced were people with high academic maturity. “They say, show me your Mummy, I tell you who you are. That’s why I honoured the graduation ceremony.
“The topic today is: Hard Work, Key to Success.’ I must tell the students of this college that hard work can take you to places. It is the golden gate to high places. Schools that fail to work hard will surely look for route to exam success.
“There is connection between hard work and corruption. Those who don’t work hard to succeed look for corrupt ways to make it faster in life. It leads to stealing to win election and go into office to steal to recover the money spent and make huge profit. But hard work will make you to break barriers. WAEC respects schools that work hard.”
Why Showers flies high without exam fraud – CEO
The CEO of Showers, Ekama Emilia Akpan, in her speech, maintained that getting the students out of malpractice but with the first of success is the strategy of the school and why the school posts excellent results that can be defended.
Congratulation the graduands, she called the Lion Class. “You merited your accolades through hard work. Your class was a formidable one, achieving top grades at the British Council Ordinary Level examination at Grade 10. Two of you, Jidenna Dibor and Jeolla Nwichi, got two BROCA Awards at first attempt. To achieve this, both of you scored 91 and 100 per cent and brought two trophies in O-level Combined Science to the school and Rivers State.”
She said three of them advanced with good passes (three subjects each) at first attempt of the AS examination in the same CAIE of Grade 11, and proceeded at Grade 12 to attempt the A2, the final level of Cambridge A-Levels in three subjects, which you took concurrently with the WASCE and NECO examinations. This is no mean feat for children between 16 and 17.
“It was your clinical discipline, capacity, and efforts that gave the school the courage to prepare you to attempt these examinations that are by no means cheap or easy to pass specially at these levels. Normally, it takes extra two years of preparation after 12th grade to pass well in these examinations. We are confident the entire class will leave the school with both certificates: A-Levels and WAEC/NECO which will assure you of direct entry into major universities abroad and into top universities in Nigeria.”
The theme of 2024 graduation and send forth was: ‘I dreamed of success, but worked hard to achieve it.’ She said this class loves football but was second best in bible quiz contest. “They bonded well and defended each other.
This is the first class that volunteered to teach the lower class. The school threw many educational issues to stretch the class; such as speaking out in class and to challenge unclear ideas. So, take a rest, tackle the next huddles.”
She urged the parents to remain vigilant.
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