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By Christy Anyanwu
An educationist, executive director of Sastoma Empowerment Foundation (STEFO), Dr. Stella Idowu Ebuetse, recently organised a literary television reality show for secondary schools.
The event, tagged “Wake Up the Giant,” is targeted at reviving reading culture and literary values among teenagers.
The show taking place across Africa had a grand audition recently with secondary school students in Ikotun/Igando Local Council Development Area (LCDA ), Lagos, in February and Ogun State in March.
The teenagers displayed their talents in various poems bordering on rape, suicide, drug abuse and examination malpractices among other social problems.
“Our literary focus this year is drama, prose, with emphasis on poetry. Though a major challenge for students, the mission is to arouse their interest in art,” Ebuetse said.
The reality show is meant for secondary schools in the South-West. These schools, she said, would further compete at the zonal level among the six states that made up the South-West region, if they qualify.
“The government has been celebrating the entertainment industry and stars more than the academic environment. This has somehy conditioned the mindset of our youths who believed more in entertainment and see education as scam.
“Most youths with first class and other academic heroes get little gratification, while the entertainment industry icon are celebrated on every media platform available, ranging from billboard, souvenirs to stickers and T-shirts, but academic icons do not get the kind of publicity and public attention entertainers get. This has to change, as it has affected the performance of students,” she said.
According to her, the extinction of literary and debating clubs and activities among the teenagers and students’ nonchalant attitude towards the genres of literature, especially poetry, gave birth to the academic literary competition, which she believed was a wake-up call.
She lamented that it was really hard to get sponsors for the literary competition simply because it was academically oriented.
“Sifax Group came to our succour by giving full support and sponsorship to the show,” she said.
She appealed to government to invest more and promote literary activities, which is on the verge of extinction.
She said if students were engaged in literary activities, it would foster unity and boost their confidence. Nigerian teenagers, she noted, were lagging behind in academic literary reality shows.
Ikotun/Igando LCDA vice-chairman, Mopelola Badmus, said Nigerian society missed the target of qualitative education.
“Education is key to development and the level of education affects every aspect of life, including the way we socialise.
“As we have seen in the performance of students today, a whole lot needs to be done to improve the standard of education, once we get it right. Social vices and ritual killings would be a thing of the past,” Badmus said
Also, the chairman of Ado-Odo Local Council Development Area (LCDA), Ogun State, Mr. Sheriff Adewale Musa, who was represented by Mr. Abayomi Oke Asiwaju, commended the group for revitalizing literary activities in order to improve the standard of education in the state.
Jahzara Obasanjo, from Bells Comprehensive College, was the winner at the Ogun State audition, while Dolamu Simisola, a student of Meridien College, and Oyewole Stephanie, from Bells Comprehensive College, were the first and second runners-up, respectively.
