No matter your level of income, you can get the best education for your children if ………..
The author of ‘the magic of thinking big’, David Schwartz gave an example of creative thinking as “a low-income family devises a plan to send their son to a leading university. That is creative thinking”, he said.
This idea is quite profound because the major factor that can change the story of such low-income families forever is to provide quality and functional education for their children. You may think this is another expensive pursuit, but check out the story below.
In one of his recent articles, The Poor Student’s Secret To Passing WAEC, Dr. Dooba narrated a story of a Northern driver with 17 children. No, this time, it is not the awful Northern story you hear in the media. It is about how the man developed a strategy that helped him send one of his children to medical school.
If one of his children is in medical school, you can only imagine how others are doing education-wise. More importantly, how this man is securing the future of himself and his children through education.
One striking thing about this is that these children are taken through public school. Which is a common story of most low-income families. However, realizing the gap this might create, the man developed a strategy to send his child to IJMB after secondary school.
His novel intention is not to make the child gain admission into 200L in the university using IJMB, no, he wants the broken bones to be mended.
He knew that it will be difficult for children from public school backgrounds in this day and age to make it into medical school. So, he felt he needed to develop their academic standing through IJMB and more importantly, he knew that having gone through IJMB, the child will get a higher grade in UTME (JAMB) to merit admission into the university.
Now, how does this concern you?
I have often argued that parents have to wake up and take control of the education of their children. No doubt about the fact that our education system is no longer serving its intended purpose. How many graduates are roaming the street? Yes, it is not their fault that they couldn’t secure a job but what was most worrisome is that most can’t even defend the certificate they were holding. They remember almost nothing from what they learnt in school talk more about applying it to achieve anything. Well, this may also not be their fault as they are mere victims of circumstances.
According to UNICEF, “schooling does not always lead to learning. Worldwide, there are more non-learners in school than out of school.”
Yes, our education is that bad and you wouldn’t want your child to be baked by the same system. Would you?
Do you have a choice? Yes. You do.
Learn from the man whose story was shared above. Don’t send your kids through the system the way it is. Like David J Schwartz said in his book, the magic of thinking big, you’ll be a ‘traditional thinker’ and your kids may not forgive you in the end for limiting their potential because you can’t think outside the box.
They are your children and you have every right to determine how they are schooled. Monitor your children properly and identify their potential. If they have potential that is related to skills, design a system that will help them develop such skills and become extremely good at it by the time they finish secondary school.
That way, you would have created an alternative for them alongside their academics. If you like, you can stop their schooling in JSS3 and make them develop the skill for 1 year and they continue to SS1 afterward.
You will be happy you make the sacrifice. After all, what is the use of a 20-year-old graduate that has nothing to show for it. The good news is that the world now rewards skills more than they do for mere academic certificates. The best is to have the two.
If they have a high potential around academics, support them by creating extra opportunities for them. Make deliberate and conscious efforts to see them through their academics, providing extra and external support where necessary. Your eye should not be on the school system, your eye should be on your child.
Finally, the whole essence of this article is to remind you that you have the power to take ownership and control of your child’s education. Don’t allow any system to take that away from you.
Awesome, exactly a discussion I had few days back