NEWS & EVENTS

Mr Tunde Ipinmisho (FNGE) reports:

NCC PICKS OGIDI SCHOOL FOR DIGITAL AWARENESS PROGRAMME

Government Day Secondary School Ogidi has been selected the National Communications Commission to benefit from its Digital Awareness Programme under its Schools Support Project. The approval was conveyed to the school's Principal in a letter dated February 1, 2017 and signed by the Commission's Director, Human Capital and Infrastructure Group, Mrs. Maryam Bayi.
According to the letter, the project involved the construction of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) laboratory, provision of furniture and Internet enabled desktop computers to provide a platform for teaching, learning, research and development.

The letter explained that the objective of the project was to encourage the use of ICT in academic development and facilitate easier access to globally available intellectual resources. The commission added that all the ICT tools to be provided under the project would become the property of the school and should under no circumstance be removed from the institution's premises.
The contractors for the project are expected to report in Ogidi soon. The project is the outcome of the tireless efforts of our very own Mr Omoniyi Ibietan, Head, Online Media and Special Publications, NCC, through who the Ogidi Community Secondary School also benefited from the Schools Support Programme two years ago. Mr Ibietan is also vigorously pushing for an infrastructure provision by the Universal Service Provision Fund (USPF), a subsidiary of the NCC.
The infrastructure, when provided, would enable service providers easily connect Ogidi to their mobile communication services.

Mr Ibietan added the following perspective to this great development:

"This current approval to OCSS was initiated in 2012. It is under NCC's School Support Programme. Interestingly, because of the need to clear the backlog of requests I just got the letter this evening. I had given up on this, hence my decision to approach the USPF, a special intervention programme/department of NCC which also undertake somewhat similar programmes like NCC. So I requested in 2014 and we got in 2015. That we are aware is completed. So, I approached NCC to reactivate my earlier request when I learnt it will be revisited. In June 2016 it was revisited and I requested to change the name of the beneficiary institution to GDSS since OCSS already got a similar project. I was told approval had been given and the department could not change the name of the institution. This is how OCSS got two similar projects. The implication is that there will 2 ICT labs at OCSS (USPF School Access Programme & NCC's Digital Awareness Programme) and these provide opportunity for more students to learn the tools for the digital economy. Fortunately, I have approached USPF again for a SAP. Taking advantage of my goodwill with the new leadership of USPF. I am happy to tell you all that by December 2017, GDSS will get a SAP project from USPF, same as the first that OCSS got. All these are different from the Base Transceiver Station, a major infrastructure connectivity project from USPF which will be undertaken in Ogidi before the end of 2017. Once that is done, all the major telecom networks will be available in Ogidi because the infrastructure will be provided by USPF and it will notify all operators to co-locate their facilities on the tower to provide services. Let us continue to pray that The Almighty God speedily perfect the work He has started. By His grace, our community can only move forward, and forward shall it migrate."