By Frederick Philander
WINDHOEK
“Graduation ceremonies are celebrations of hard work, joy and accomplishment. This is indeed a joyous night, a night of celebration for the founder, MD, staff and graduates of Lingua College.”
So said Deputy Minister of Education Dr Becky Ndjoze-Ojo, last week at the first graduation ceremony of the institution that was started by a former teacher at Jan Jonker Afrikaner Secondary School in Katutura.
“Lingua Consultancy Services is the realization of a research project by the founder of the Institution, Ingrid Kloppers (Mettler). Originally the idea was to develop a Language Tourism programme for Namibia as part of her studies, which eventually developed into the establishment of Lingua Consultancy Services,” she said at the event that was attended by many academics, family members and the graduand students.
The institution was originally established with the aim to provide Language Training, Consultancy Services, Translation and Interpretation services.
“In addition to these services, Lingua Consultancy Services has in the meantime expanded its services to provide tertiary education to Grade 12 or equivalent qualification to school leavers. Much of the funding for this institution came from consultancy services, translation and interpretation services provided to various local and foreign companies,” the deputy minister informed the audience.
In an emphatic reminder, Ndjoze-Ojo added: “For all those who have successfully completed their training, the challenge must surely be to continue to strive towards self-perfection, self mastery for the collective good, for the benefit of our country and our nation as a whole and to continue to ask questions and present answers that can take us towards a more humane and sustainable world.
“The challenge is that in your approach to the needs of this country and of this continent, you become more creative and that you use this creativity to benefit humanity as a whole.
“Our training programmes must be liberating and seek to humanize us, as much as our role is also to bring about a greater caring for and giving to others. All our efforts should be geared toward real and profound consciousness of the need for, and the gains of a more people-centred and inclusive world,” she advised.
A display of the reality of the country’s unity-in-diversity and the people’s relentless willingness to work together as one nation on a world stage is a challenge that must be deliberately tackled if the country is to move together towards Vision 2030.
“Indeed, this has required of us that we reshape the way we see ourselves and the way we develop our identities. All our graduates should come out of their training fully aware of their responsibilities as part of the frontline of the African renaissance and accept the challenge to market their country and continent on the world stage,” Ndjoze-Ojo asserted.
In her view, every day offers another learning opportunity, the truly wise listen more than they speak, and when they speak their task is to ask questions, to make discoveries, to theorize, to do research and to be implementers of plans that are workable and produce tangible results.
“We are a nation of infinite possibilities and we do not expect any less of our graduates than we do of ourselves. We come from people who dared to dream against all odds and to make their dreams come true.
“Our task is never to give in or to fold our arms, but rather to make connections, to seek solutions, to plan, to prosper, to create anew and above to work hard,” she concluded.