Official Release: www.OluwakoredeAsuni.com
Youth Corp Member Conceived, Designed and Transfers First Public School Web-portal in Niger State, Nigeria
Oluwakorede Asuni, a batch A 2008 youth corp member completing his primary assignment at the Government Secondary School, Minna, Niger State has completed the design and implementation of a school web portal for Government Secondary School, Minna.
The portal will be officially commissioned by the Niger State Commissioner for Science and Technology, under the distinguished Chairmanship of the Chairman, House Committee on Education Niger State House of Assembly at 11:30 am on Thursday 19th February, 2009 at the Government Secondary School, Minna computer laboratory.
You can take a sneak peek here: www.GovernmentSecondarySchooMX.org/index.php.
The system will be available at: www.GovernmentSecondarySchooMX.org as from the 19th of February when it will be officially unveiled and presented to the public.
The feature rich system has amongst others the following:
· Home page/Welcome screen—welcomes the visitor to the website site and introduces available resources. The home page also features news on current activities in the school or that the students and staff of the school are involved in at any given time;
- Staff list;
- School Calendar;
- Teaching and Examination Time Tables;
- eMail: Customised email accounts for all principal staff of the school and the school’s senior prefect;
- Videos and Pictures gallery: A repository of selected pictures and videos from school events;
- External links to students support resources;
- Newsletter subscription and delivery system for serving monthly school magazine;
It rides on a deployment of the Joomla! CMS and uses a tweaked Joomla Art (J.A. Purity) template – which is a simple and easy to use template that comes pre-installed with the version 1.5.9 of the CMS.
Amongst others the portal will provide information sharing resources for staff and students, put the school on the global map of educational service providers and open another page for Nigeria in the book of good public image.
The project has been planned for the first five years, and the school authority has accepted responsibility for its sustenance.
Mr. Oluwakorede Asuni has put in place a web development training program to empower staff and students with requisite skills for the maintenance of the portal. This special training will also equip trainees to undertake projects of similar magnitude in future.
Given the feedback gathered from test sessions of the system, Mr. Asuni remains convinced that the website is a welcome development and its objectives will be surpassed.
Mr. Asuni declares:
‘This project was undertaken as a community development project in the community in which I completed my one year National Youth Service as provided for in the NYSC rules and regulations.
I wish to seize this opportunity to share with all that though the lofty ideals for which the NYSC was created appears defeated the scheme remains a golden opportunity for personal development, social integration and setting oneself apart from the crowd. It is an opportunity to show drive and put oneself at a point of vantage which will set one apart in the labour market – which seems the ultimate for many.
And to those charged with managing the scheme, I suggest a revision of the policy(s) and laws guiding the scheme with the goal of identifying what works and does not and the adoption of global best practises to maintain relevance in the emerging global village. Perhaps then, graduates will once again look forward to their deployment for the scheme.
On my outlook for the future, I hope to continue to work in areas that support sustainable development, human capital development/management and the use of ICTs in education and development.
Note:
Oluwakorede Asuni is a 2008 PIN/Microsoft Internet Safety Security and Privacy Initiative for Nigeria (MISSPIN) Ambassador. He hails from the Ijebu North Local Government of Ogun State and graduated from the department of Physics, Olabisi Onabanjo University (formerly Ogun State University), Ogun State Nigeria in 2007.
He wrote and published in 2006 (and updated twice in 2007 and 2008) the book: Students’ Survival Kit – a performance guide for undergraduates in Nigeria (ISBN: 978-076-408-9) www.thestudentsurvivalkit.com.
He maintains a personal website at www.OluwakoredeAsuni.com and blogs at: www.OluwakoredeAsuni.com/blogs.html.
