The Proprietor, Ferscoat International School, Pastor Felix Opata, has urged stakeholders in the education sector to lay more emphasis on sports in schools.
He also advised them to give more opportunities to learners talented in sporting activities and not only those who excel academically.
Opata stated this at the school’s 11th Biennial inter-house sports competition, themed: “Nurturing Future Champions through Grassroots Sports” at the weekend.
Opata, who also doubles as the Director of Studies, said though the sole responsibility of nurturing talents should have been the role of the government through its agencies like the ministry of sports, but due to their failure, local groups like NAPPS, ANCOPPS and several others could take it up.
He added that opportunities like the inter-house sports competition organised by the school should be created for young ones to move from the grassroots level to the state and national levels.
He said, “I am sure competitions like this brought up people like our sport icon and sport personalities,” he said.
While adding that sports is not optional in an educational institution, Opata said parents should not see sport as just by the way side, it is part and parcel of every school programme.
He however added that to organise sporting activities in times like this is very expensive and as such needs the support of all stakeholders especially parents.
“It is noteworthy to mention that the crop of parents that we have now are people that understand sports as part of education.
Thanking parents for their support for the success of the event, Opata said with their cooperation, school might sponsor talents discovered at the event to go higher in their chosen sporting activity. “We can sponsor some of them to get to highest heights.”
On what the school intended to achieve with the event, Opata explained that before now the students had accused the school of focusing on academics more than other things, saying, “But aside academics, this is one of the ways to socialise, to bring them together and instill the spirit of sportsmanship in them.
“It is not about the sports activities alone but to instill in them the spirit of sportsmanship, the spirit of competition and that they learn from here.
The Principal, Ferscoat Comprehensive Academy, Mr. Frederick Opata, said the event was necessary and important because it was a way of catching them young at the grassroots.
“We believe at this event we are going to identify some great talents and that is why we have a sport icon represented at this event and will be able to pinpoint who can go far.”
Speaking on the meeting point between academics and sporting activities, Fred Opata explained that there are three domain of education and psychomotor is one of them, adding that that was the sporting activities the school was having because without sports there is no complete education.
Head teacher of Ferscoat Nursery and Primary School, Mrs. Rose Ashefor, said the event was aimed at catching them young from the grass roots.
“Our aim is to tap them young and expose them and encourage them to also explore that part of their lives and not just academics,” she explained.
In his remarks at the event, sports icon and Olympic Gold and Bronze medalist, Enefiok-udo Obong, commended the school for the initiative and said discovering talents was not the job of the government alone but an individual thing because it was at events like this that great talents had been discovered in the past.
“The government’s duty is to create the platform, to build infrastructure and people will have the opportunity to make use of it,” he said.
He added that it was also necessary to have some set of people that could encourage these students to take up sports in different ways “and that is one of the things we are doing by encouraging schools like this to compete in the International Schools Athletes Championship coming up in March.”
He, however, advised parents to always look at the innate ability in every child and help to develop it because they need to understand that when they send them to school, it was not enough for them to read only, because education is multi- facetted.
He said, “You are sending them to interact with other children in order to bring out the talent in them.
“What stands out in one child to the other is the talent and whenever we notice a talent, be it in sports, academics, IT, Computer usage, it is necessary we develop the talent and to expose it so that it can be monetize and have better life with it.”
At the end of the competition, Green House came first; Blue House, second; Yellow House, third and Purple House, fourth.