Early graduation for 1,000 students

 By PHILIP KEPSON

KOPEN Secondary School in Enga hosted an early graduation ceremony last Friday.

Hundreds of parents who attended the 15th dual graduation ceremony of more than 1,000 Grades 10 and 12 students could not find any comfort in seeing their loved ones receiving academic awards and attainment certificates as it started raining just before the formal programme started and continued until late afternoon.

But that did not stop the students from walking up to receive their awards as parents watched from the muddy grounds.

Guest speaker, Enga Teachers College principal Michael Homingu urged the students to be committed and disciplined to realise their dreams of becoming educated citizens to contribute meaningfully towards nation-building.

“You will be the future leaders and builders of this nation. To be able to do that, you have to be disciplined and committed towards studies to acquire the right skills and qualification to contribute competitively to the well-being of the community,” he said.

Eddie Mula, from the office of Governor Peter Ipatas, said the provincial government last week signed a memorandum of understanding to formally handover the school to the Catholic Mission to run.

He said Ipatas and his government had made the decision for the school to celebrate with the graduation because the church had run the school without problems for the past two years.

School board chairman Fr Lukas Kambao said his church would be committed to ensuring that Kopen Secondary School became a top learning institution in the province.