Soofia Science Festival Day 1
The sound of a roaring yellow motor bike in Botha – Bothe town attracts the attention of people along the way as it leads the procession from the school along Main North 1 through town center leading to the Ministry of Education and Training. People all stand still and cars are static as traffic cops controls the drive in and out of town, thousands of children in neat navy blue school uniform march in silence into town. The children are holding two big banners reading Soofia International School and Soofia Science Festival (SSF 2). The students have also designed placards with pronouncement of Sustainable Development Goal 2 of ” A family of zero hunger in Lesotho.”
I hear one street vendor ask ” Which school is this? Could it be a protest march because news of human traffickers kidnapping children is spreading like veld fire?
Oh! How sad the incidences are! I approach her and explain;
“No! Soofia International is hosting an awareness campaign tomorrow dubbed Soofia Science Festival. Look at that placard.” I point to one placard and we read it together ” We have no tolerance of hunger”.
“Oh! Now I understand,” she said.
“We are doing this to raise awareness about hunger in our country and around the world. We believe that if we take part in food production, it is possible not to be a hungry nation that is supported by imported food and donations from other countries.”
SOCCER CELEBRATION
In order to commemorate the Soofia Science Festival, a friendly soccer match between the science club students and students from other departments took place. The science club team was beaten 11:02. Man of the match Khoeli Thloriso from the select team comprised of other departments received a trophy and a gold medal while the second best player Kananelo Motjolopane [select team] walked away with a silver medal.
Bofihla Griffiths was crowed the highest goal scorer and awarded a gold medal and a trophy, he was seconded by Tlotliso Tejane who received a silver medal. The best goal keeper of the day was Hape Tuke who also received a trophy and a gold medal.
Following that, was the AS students versus the teachers and had 90 minutes play. The AS outplayed the teachers 11-9 goals.
Soofia Science Festival Day 2
Friday the 20th April 2018, Soofia Science Festival is here. Twelve schools from around Lesotho are taking part in the event. The festival comprises of four categories, SSF Presentation, SSF Project, SSF Junior Quiz, SSF Senior Quiz.
The SSF Project is a category where two students worked together towards a project that is in line with the theme “A family of zero hunger in Lesotho”. Each school had representatives and projects to display. Some were really very interesting, unique, informative and outstanding inventions. Imagine the power of research and presentation on topics such as; music and plants, vertical farming methods, fighting hunger through the use of affordable classic greenhouse, plant empowerment techniques.
I witnessed Tuke Tsebiso and Moshe Mokatja of Soofia International School present their project. Their project aims to provide protection of our crops from high sunlight intensity and excess rains using an electrically operated water system. This project will touch on the lives of the disabled and old people who often fell hopeless and helpless when it comes to farm work. I was emotionally touched when these boys presented, they had a project good enough for a final year student in electronics at university. It was amazing; we were all left in awe. Even the adjudicators and the competing students joined in clapping for these students after the presentation.The project presentations were indeed innovative and real.
The SSF Junior and Senior quiz comprised of an online quiz that ran for one hour. Each school was represented by two students for each quiz category. The beautiful students sat down to write the quiz which left Soofia International School and Leribe English Medium School in a Junior Science quiz on tie. The two students in a tie went down for another twenty minutes quiz.
Immediately after the SSF quiz and SSF projects have been presented, the students and teachers all moved to the spacious hall to watch the SSF Presentation. The topic of the Presentation was
“Conventional food producers claim there are not enough scientific evidence for organic food production and consumption being better for health and environment. Could this be true?”.
Two students from each school walked to the stage to give a presentation over a well researched topic with strong referencing. From this category the best presenter couple walked away with three trophies, two gold medals, two science dictionaries and M 2500. The second winner won a trophy, two silver medals, two science dictionaries and M 1000 while the last pair walked away with a trophy,two bronze medals and M 500.
