By Dipo Olowookere
The Oyo State Governor, Mr Abiola Ajimobi, says his administration will continue to reward excellence in academic activities, as it sets out to revamp the academic standard of the state for greatness with appropriate policies.
He made this commitment at the recent inauguration of Oyo State Schools’ Governing Board; a new initiative to coordinate the administration of secondary schools in the state.
The event also witnessed the recognition of the best overall student in the 2015 WAEC who is an indigene of Oyo state.
The awardee, Mr David Babalola, a 200 level Medicine student of the University of Ibadan with CGPA of 7.0, flanked by his parents Prof. and Mrs Babalola stood tall as Governor Abiola Ajimobi presented him with cash award and scholarship at the International Conference Centre, University of Ibadan.
Mr Babalola, an indigene of Saki from Oke Ogun axis of the state was described by Governor Ajimobi as one of Oyo State’s brightest minds as he came out in flying colours in the 2015 WAEC examination, scoring A1 in eight subjects including English Language and Mathematics with a total of 673.7626.
At the event, a Development Expert, Mr Michael Ale who was also made the Chairman of Jericho High School told Mr Babalola “We are very proud of you, David. To show how delighted we are with your performance, to encourage our other children to do the same, and to demonstrate our government’s commitment to excellence, I hereby announce the award of a full scholarship to you till you complete your current course of medical studies at the University of Ibadan.
“In addition, the sum of N250,000 is to be given to David in recognition of his outstanding achievement, and for bringing glory to himself, his family and the good people of Oyo State”.
Mr Ale, who gave David N100,000, pledged to do more, “I was impressed with the CV of the best student in WAEC 2015, his impressive achievement, I think the more you encourage, the more he grows in knowledge.
“I donated N100,000 to support his scholarship that was given to him by Oyo State Government and also a means of assisting the state government”.
“We shall look beyond now, in five years to see that we bring value that is necessary, the value that we expected in a public school that will look more like a private setting, especially Jericho High School brought me up to this level, it invested in me and has done a lot for me in the area of education, social interaction, ethics and moral value.
“Within the next two years the school will experience great transformation especially in the performance of the students and I can say very clearly that students can’t perform without teachers, so we are going to start our repositioning from the teachers.
“We are not going to work on Jericho High School alone, we are going to collaborate with other schools and learn from their own way, we are going to copy and imitate good things from those schools,” Mr Ale added.
It would be recalled that the Oyo State Government also recently rewarded 26 pupils from various schools who have represented the state in various National competitions for being good ambassadors.
Commissioner for Education, Science and Technology, Professor Adeniyi, who presented the gifts to the 26 pupils for their excellent performances in Mathematical Association of Nigeria (MAN), Science Teachers Association of Nigeria (STAN) and Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), competitions in Ibadan stated that there is no amount of time, energy and money that can be regarded as too much on Education.
According to the commissioner, “Education as we all know is a veritable tool and instrument to alleviate and subsequently banish ignorance and poverty, whatever is devoted to education therefore multiplies in turn.”
Professor Olowofela reiterated the government’s policies such as stoppage of mass promotion of students, promotion based on 80 percent class attendance and above average performance, inauguration of Schools’ Governing Boards (SGB) for effective control and teaching, massive renovation of schools and supply of science equipment would help to save education from its present position.
Modupe Gbadeyanka