Bravo to St Joseph�s College

Mmegi Editor | Friday February 27, 2015 14:00

This is the second consecutive year the school has achieved top position. In second spot is Naledi Secondary School followed by Mater Spei College at third and Selebi-Phikwe, and Gaborone Senior Secondary Schools at positions four and five respectively.

We acknowledge that these schools are in cities and towns, where the students are exposed to learning facilities at home, public institutions such as libraries, and even during their spare time, as compared to their counterparts in rural areas.

It takes a dedicated student to attain good marks in rural areas, and many of them occupy high positions in government institutions and the private sector.  So, being a rural student cannot be used as an excuse for poor performance.

On the flipside, students in urban centres faced and beat some obstacles to attain good grades and secure jobs.

For St Joseph’s College, a mission school, having occupied the top spot for a consecutive second year, is not by a  superb performance  manufactured somewhere in the sky, or by a rocket scientist.  It took dedicated men and women who sacrificed their time to teach the students; it took the support staff such as administrators to make sure that logistics were put in place for educators to do their work. 

We cannot forget the labourers, such as groundsmen, cleaners and cooks who made it their mission to be parents of the students despite not knowing them. A visit to St Josephs College says it all, as the students display the highest level of discipline.

The school requires the students to wear uniforms that cover their knees, presentable dress code for male students, and most importantly, no cellphones or other electronic gargets that may distract the learners.

The above-mentioned requirements were applied just over two decades ago and the results were very good. What we are seeing these days in other schools is that students attend class with cellphones. They spend most of the time on social media. They dress like hooligans and they have no respect for elders.

They utter non-printables, touch their female colleagues’ bodies in a familiar way  irrespective of who is around them.

With today’s students facing an array of temptations from technology, media, peer pressure, and lack of guidance at home, it would be proper for the ministry to come up with strict conditions in government schools.

Today’s thought

“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones you did do.”

 

- Mark Twain