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From Jude Chinedu, Enugu
International President of a non-governmental youth and faith-based organisation, known as Pleasant Gathering, Mrs. Joy Ogbonnaya, has appealed to the federal and state governments as well as good spirited individuals to come to their aid by providing land for the group to build a convention centre.
Every year, the group hosts a mega convention of secondary school students in Enugu State in partnership with the Post Primary Schools Management Board (PPSMB) under the State Ministry of Education.
Established in 2006, the group with the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) consultative status of the United Nations, aims at empowering and equipping the next generation to fulfil their destinies and become people with high ethical standards.
To this end, the organization instituted the Pleasant Gathering Reading Club with a view to enhancing the reading culture of secondary school students in Enugu State. The club is also restoring moral values which had gradually and steadily ebbed amongst students.
Daily Sun gathered that the reading club has been inaugurated in over 100 secondary schools (Public, Private and Missions) within the Enugu metropolis and beyond, with a team of volunteer facilitators going to these schools every school day to mentor the students.
Ogbonnaya made the appeal at this year’s edition of the Pleasant Gathering at the Nnamdi Azikiwe Stadium, Enugu, with the theme: “Nigerian students as agents of transformation.”
She also appealed for sponsorship of the annual convention and monthly stipends for its facilitators, adding that, “We need the inclusion of our developed moral scheme in the school curriculum.
“It is now eleven years of operation and it might interest you to know that for these years of vigorous impact amongst the students and their schools, the Pleasant Gathering and its educational project, the Reading Club as a capital-intensive project, has been run on zero funding without any state, national or international funding.
“Yet, the impact has been conspicuous such as the free transportation and free feeding of thousands of students as you can witness today. But we are poised to do much more.”
According to Ogbonnaya, some of the glaring impacts of the Reading Club on the students and schools include increase of academic and moral knowledge, capacity development through competition and quizzes, talent discovery, development, and deployment, skill acquisition through seminars and workshops amongst others.
The mega convention which started in 2012 brings together large number of students and their teacher-coaches, with last year’s edition, at the Main Bowl of the Nnamdi Azikiwe Stadium, Enugu, attracting over 5000 participants.
