Customize Consent Preferences

We use cookies to help you navigate efficiently and perform certain functions. You will find detailed information about all cookies under each consent category below.

The cookies that are categorized as "Necessary" are stored on your browser as they are essential for enabling the basic functionalities of the site. ... 

Always Active

Necessary cookies are required to enable the basic features of this site, such as providing secure log-in or adjusting your consent preferences. These cookies do not store any personally identifiable data.

No cookies to display.

Functional cookies help perform certain functionalities like sharing the content of the website on social media platforms, collecting feedback, and other third-party features.

No cookies to display.

Analytical cookies are used to understand how visitors interact with the website. These cookies help provide information on metrics such as the number of visitors, bounce rate, traffic source, etc.

No cookies to display.

Performance cookies are used to understand and analyze the key performance indexes of the website which helps in delivering a better user experience for the visitors.

No cookies to display.

Advertisement cookies are used to provide visitors with customized advertisements based on the pages you visited previously and to analyze the effectiveness of the ad campaigns.

No cookies to display.

  Namcol learners can win up to N$3000 for essay writing

Home Youth Corner   Namcol learners can win up to N$3000 for essay writing

By Sabina Elago

 

WINDHOEK-Namibian College of Open Learning (Namcol)’s learners have until July 28 to register for the annual Essay Writing Competition for Grade 10s and 12s.

Uajoroka Kazombiaze, Namcol’s Distance Education Coordinator, and the competition organiser, says  the competition has been running for six years now and it is only meant for Namcol’s Grades 10s and 12s learners who have registered for English, Afrikaans, Otjiherero, Oshindonga, Oshikwanya, Rukwangali and Silozi 1st and 2nd languages, as well as learners who have registered for the Grade 12 English Communication Course. “We want encourage learners to also use their mother tongue in this competition,” says Kazombiaze.

The competition is the institution’s ways of getting learners improve their language skills. “We want Namcol learners to improve their writing skills, explore the various languages and be able to manipulate sentence structures, organise ideas and arguments and to improve their language proficiency,” says Kazombiaze adding that note should be taken that not all learners partake in the competition but that “we would like to believe that the Essay Writing Competition plays a role in the improvement of the learners’ performance in the languages of those few who take part.”

Among the topics  learners can write about are, “The media should be controlled by the government”  an Argumentative essay; “A World without laws” an Descriptive essay,  and “Participating in team sports helps to develop good character and employment to immigrants”  an Expository Essay and “Life is unpredictable,” a narrative essay. “Learners are expected to write good strong essays with original creative spark, instructions executed, information correctly interpreted, with creative use of vocabulary,  idioms, grammar, spelling and interesting paragraph, as that is what the judges are looking for in a winning essay,” urges Kazombiaze.

The competition has two categories, the Junior Secondary for Grade 10s and senior secondary for Grade 12s and there will be three winners from the four regions, the Southern, Northern Central and Northern East regions.

For the Grade 10s the essay must be 350 to 400 words and for the Grade 12s 450 to 500 words. Interest from learners taking part in the competition has been varying  depending on the marketing strategies, sufficient support and motivation learners receive from head of centre’s and tutors at their centers’ respectively, “so we encourage all learners to take part,” encourages Kazombiaze.

The winning essay will win a cash prize of N$1500, second N$ 800, third N$ 500 and the overall prize of N$3000, meaning the best of the four first prize winners from the four regions.  The essays will be placed in newspapers  for the young people in the public to learn from them how to argue or write speeches in an organised consistent manner. Judges are qualified language teachers and experts, assures Kazombiaze.