Best Intellectuals Model School, Ohanku in Aba, Abia State, has been named in the top 10 shortlists for the new $250,000 World’s Best School Prizes.
The school was selected in the category of ‘World’s Best School Prize for Overcoming Adversity’ as its students made a music video to boost students’ morale during a period of turmoil that rocked Nigerian society and it went viral in the process.
The five World’s Best School Prizes, founded by T4 Education in partnership with Accenture, American Express, Yayasan Hasanah, Templeton World Charity Foundation, and the Lemann Foundation, focus on celebrating schools for the pivotal role they play in developing the next generation of learners and for their enormous contribution to society’s progress, especially in the wake of COVID-19.
Vikas Pota, founder of T4 Education and the World’s Best School Prizes, said the launch of the World’s Best School Prizes represents a grassroots solution to help build the systemic change needed in education.
According to Pota, by telling the stories of inspirational schools that are transforming the lives of their students and making a real difference in their communities, schools can share their best practices and have their voices heard at the top table to help transform education.
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Pota said that with over 1.5 billion learners impacted by the school and university closures, Covid-19 has greatly exacerbated a global education crisis in which, even before the pandemic, the UN warned that progress was already too slow to achieve universal quality education by 2030.
Pota commended Best Intellectuals Model School for making the Top 10 shortlists for the inaugural World’s Best School Prizes, adding that educators all over the world will now be able to learn from the example of this outstanding Nigerian school.
The top three finalists for each of the five World’s Best School Prizes – for Community Collaboration, Environmental Action, Innovation, Overcoming Adversity, and Supporting Healthy Lives – will be announced later this year.
After a public advisory vote, the winner of each prize will be chosen based on rigorous criteria by a Judging Academy comprising distinguished leaders all across the globe including academics, educators, NGOs, social entrepreneurs, government, civil society, and the private sector.
The winners will be announced in October 2022 at World Education Week and a prize of $250,000 will be equally shared among the winners of the five prizes, with each receiving an award of $50,000.
All the 50 shortlisted schools for the five prizes will share their best practices through toolkits that showcase their ‘secret sauce’ to innovative approaches and step-by-step instructions on how others can replicate their methods to help improve education everywhere.
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