BBNaija vs Education, How has the show influenced our Lives
It is another season of the seasonal TV reality show called BBNaija which the sole aim is still to blur in the hearts of many people including the viewers of the show, as the show gets more and more audience due to its content and the prize attached to the show which rises higher every season. The BBNaija reality TV show started up as Big Brother African but over time it was brought home to the be a solely Nigeria show which will only accommodate Nigerians.
With the rise of the popularity of the show people have started asking questions if our educational system still have a place in the society and when the two is compared education stands no chance at all. The selecting process of the show has nothing to do with Educational qualification may be it is so to give everybody equal chance of participating in the show, but questions are:
What is the sole aim of the BBNaija reality TV show?
How is the BBNaija promoting the what Nigeria as a country wants the World to see us as?
Is the price to help build entrepreneurship skills among youths in the country if yes how well have they watched that play out if no then, what’s the need of gathering young men and woman in one house feed them for over two months and give one person huge sums of money as winning prize?
Trying to answer these questions and placing them hand in hand with what our educational sector demands and requires from the students we know if the school system still has value in our society. The current BBNaija reality TV show is tagged BBNaija Lockdown and the cash price is 85 million Naira outside the sponsorship deals the person will be entitled to after the show. The show is rated 18 plus but in our various homes kids below 18 konws the names of the housemate which means they are glue to the show.
Trying to compare BBNaija with education will make you wipe for the education, during one of the seasons which was won by Efe and he was rewarded with #25,000,000 (twenty-five million Naira) a student of Lagos University also won the best graduating student, he graduated with 5 points which is the highest a university student can get, he was rewarded with #25,000 (twenty-five thousand Naira).
If you are following this story you will agree with me that it will be better you work your way to the BBNaija house than spend almost 20 years of your life chasing education to get #25,000 twenty-five thousand at the end when you can get #25,000,000 (twenty-five million naira) in three months by living a lie they call life.
Also, in Benue State University, in the year 2010, a student won the best graduating student of the depart and was rewarded with just #1000 (one thousand naira) according to the student, the price was not even given to her. Below is her story:
“Anytime I remember that someone will win ₦85M for just staying in a house kissing, gossiping & eating free food, I open my drawer, bring out my certificate & use it to be fanning myself because it can’t be useless to me outside & still be useless inside.”It reminds me of something. In 2006 I was the Best Graduating Student of the Department of English, Benue State University, Makurdi. At the combined convocation in 2010, it was announced, and I was issued a letter indicating that I had won the HOD’s Prize for the Best Graduating Student of English. The amount was One thousand naira. I mean, 1000 naira only. I didn’t feel excited about it, but somehow, armed with the award letter, I went to the bursary to cash the #1000. Twice, I was told that the University had not released the money. Hmmm, I just gave up and never went back there till today. In that same University, individuals and organisations were sponsoring miss BSU, miss this, miss that, and awarding them cars, huge sums of money and other consolation/ runners up prizes. I couldn’t help thinking that our society is one that has no respect, honour or proper recognition for intellectualism. Instead, it lavishly rewards mediocrity and sensuality. Little wonder, we are not making much progress, and academic hard work is fast disappearing. Why would a beautiful girl want to work hard to make good grades when she knows that winning a MISS can fetch her a car and cash with little sweat? This, among other reasons, is why there is a rise in the establishment of the “missing or misses” institution in the university, where stellar academic performance should be the most honourable and admirable thing. We began to have “misses” in so many departments and faculties on campus: Miss BUTASA, miss MACOSA, etc, etc (even tribal and community associations began to organize their misses and faces). Perhaps, the rise of the “missing” or “misses” institution in the Ivory Tower was a prophetic indication that the Citadel of Learning had begun to MISS out on the issues that really mattered. This is why someone will not think of gathering scientists and sponsoring them to bring out world-shaking inventions and rewarding the greatest inventor at the end of the show. Even at this critical time in history, that someone is not thinking of sponsoring medical researchers, housing them to bring up a vaccine against COVID 19. Instead, we are waiting for America and Europe to bring up the solution while we spend our money to sponsor sensual indulgence that only serves to satisfy our base instincts and fantasies. Meanwhile, when a pastor builds a big church, we suddenly become very wise and begin to hector him for building a big Church instead of a factory, as if he is called to be an industrialist and not pastor! When a society has been so properly denuded of such simple moral reasoning and decorum that it places sensuality above intellectualism, we cannot expect to go forward at reasonable speed.”
This is only a few among thousands of cases like this in the country another student also gave his own testimony about a similar incident in the same University, he said this after posting the certificate
“I didn’t get 1 Kobo from this after 8 years each time the document is presented to the bursary for payment they will simply ask me to waitThe 30k will make sense during this lockdownShould I sue the Benue State University or the Nigerian Police”?
For me I think morality is gradually being eroded from the society with the BBNaija consistently trending and we are helping in that process, our religious organisations have stood against this till they have now finally fallen for the same thing they preach against, recently a preacher was saying God showed him the person that will win the BBNaija Lockdown season, which means he is a big fan of the reality TV show.
With all of this now do you really think Education still stand a chance in the society or is the popular saying “SCHOOL NA SCAM” true? do you think BBNaija doing good in our today’s world or has BBNaija come to take out our morality and render education useless? Drop your comment and tell us the way forward.
