My Neighborhood Watch #63 - Reporting Events Around us

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The ground has it again. Death has supplied it with food. It's sad to say this young boy was its prey, a prey for something that would have been controlled. His death story will pain your bone down to your marrow. Let me give the narrative.

On the 21st of August, this young boy embarked on the unending struggle journey to write an exam. It's quite unfortunate that the exam was written with frustration, struggles, stampede and chaos. How was this possible? An exam you may ask.

It all started when a department in my institution organised a meeting to change the examination pattern of writing. GST, known as General Studies, has been a long-standing course in the university, where all those admitted newly offer the course up to their second year in school. This general study is usually written via paper and then marked by lecturers involved.

They saw the stress of marking over 5000 scripts every semester, so they decided to come up with an innovation that would ease their marking. They decided to go virtual, where students write their exams through CBT. This innovation was implemented last year in a week. They allocated days for students who registered to write the exams comfortably, but that didn't turn out well as it was their first time.

Over a thousand students came to write the exams a particular day as they kept coming and returning without writing the exams. It was the second-to-last day for the examination. All those who couldn't write assembled that day and forced themselves to write. We were threatened that we would carry over the course if we didn't write. The venue for the examination was just two and small.

It could only contain a few numbers, whereas a thousand wanted writing that day. The stampede was just too much as students struggled to write the exams in chaos and pressure. A lot of people fainted due to the chaos in the crowd and lack of supply of oxygen. This was when I believed the saying that school is the survival of the fittest. School is not for the weak. I nearly lost my life but was determined.

After seeing these incidents, they changed venues for writing the exams in places that would be accommodating. Sadly, the merged set outnumbered those who wrote last year, and the chaos was even too much. The stampede, struggle, and pressure made this young boy in the department of Human Anatomy lose his life because of an examination. Reports have it that the boy ran out of inhaler as an asthmatic patient.

He was on the verge of writing the exams when the stampede and pressure from a compressed crowd of students triggered his asthma.

Before help was rendered, he lay dead on the floor as the attack was just suffocating and strong. He died because the educational system failed and his health issues contributed. Some asked why he would go into such a crowd to write an exam. I won't blame him much because it was this same fear of losing out completely that made lots of freshmen faint last session, and now someone has died because of the exams.

Source	Sympathisers

What would the system do to implement a change? This is what we are watching and expecting to see. Quite unfortunate luck ran out of him that he couldn't survive the four walls of school. It's very painful to see he just started. Tears would be a river in the parent's ecosystem, losing their son. I totally sympathise with them, as I was once in that condition where I saw death with my eyes.

I couldn't give up on both ends. So I had to fight for my life. If you're a student in a federal university, it's quite common that similar things are faced where students struggle to learn, struggle to attend classes, struggle to write tests and exams, and even struggle to enter a shuttle bus. If you lose your life, school continues. There's a saying that you shouldn't go beyond your limit, as it's sometimes very risky.

	When the system is bad, the people suffer

People will still struggle and will come out struggling again to look for jobs. The educational system is just an enlightenment to things unknown. You just have to play along and not allow the system to consume you with its stings. Stress is tantamount in the life of every student. Your health matters the most. If disregarded for knowledge acquisition, you may end up losing both. This experience is a big lesson to all students out there.

Dear Kuyik,

It surprised me to see you leave so soon because of a seemingly small thing that would have been handled properly educationally. It saddens my heart to hear the ground has you as food. With every hope and confidence held in my heart, I hope to see you again in the resurrection. Never had anyone thought of something like this. I'm pained.

I invite @whizzbro4eva, @nsijoro @vudeme123

Cc,
@xkool24