FIVE thousand, two hundred and twenty three participants, comprising the state school improvement team, school improvement officers, education secretaries, heads of sections, head teachers and class teachers have been trained on literacy and numeracy teaching skills while 743 head teachers participated in a four day leadership training programme organised by the Lagos State Universal Basic Education Board.

I can’t say this without actually thanking the then Commissioner for Higher Education, Prof Hope Eghagha who was untiring in his efforts because when I was there the DPP which was the main opposition political party took a page of a newspaper to lambast the PDP government and actually showed that the faculty of Engineering as it were at that time was bushy. I remember vividly the day the Commissioner came visiting and had to do some clearing to get him into the place and from then on, he ensured that contractors were regularly on site and they delivered the Administrative block and on other block and made sure that a second block was ready with one of the two laboratories.

DELTA State Governor, Dr. Emmanuel Uduaghan, has urged institutions of higher learning in the state to organize annual convocation for their graduating students. The Governor made the call at the weekend during the first combined convocation ceremony of the Delta State Polytechnic, Otefe-Oghara, Ethiope West local government area of the state. According to him, annual convocation ceremonies were vital in institutions of higher learning as it encourages students to strive towards completing the academic work with their mates.

“We are giving the parents the best quality and we will not stop at anything to make our students to compete favourably with their peers anywhere and to succeed in their academic endeavor,” the Vice-Chancellor said. He attributed the giant stride attained by the university in all spheres of its development to the support of the founder, Dr. Oladega Adebogun, the lecturers and students, saying without their dedication and commitment in all ramifications, “we would not have achieved this far.”

“The big mistake government is making is that it thinks it’s only the Federal or State governments alone bring development to Nigeria. So, there are genuine people who are interested in developing their nation, government can extend a hand of fellowship to these people, not those who will abuse the system. Constant checks can also be done on these people, if they are given grants. By the time grants are given to about 3, 000 of such organizations, government must have created over 3, 000 new jobs.