The principal, Nigerian Tulip International College, Mr. Erdjan Yilmaz, has said that sport education is a major part of academics and has been a medium for students’ achievements.
Speaking at the school’s 5th inter-house sport competition held at the Agege Stadium, Lagos, he argued that sport should be part of education.
Yilmaz said, “Sport is not different from education, they go together. Today, we have achieved a lot, we have so many medals, and we have a trophy from football and lots more. Extra-curriculum activities educate also and that is why we are all happy to be here with the management.
“One of our brothers, who is good at basketball, has got MBA scholarship in that field. We have so many students on scholarships through sports. We got trophy at a competition with Lagos private schools. We encourage our students to participate in sport and we pick from among them the best ones and push them further. Sport and academics are together.”
In the same vein, the Chairman of the school’s Parent Teacher Association, Engr. Opeyemi Aminu, said that sport was as important as education. He argued that the brain and body had to work together and without sport, this would be difficult.
He said, “Without education, many things will be in disarray and for us to have quality education apart from the equipment, we need teachers mostly and not just teachers, quality teachers and that is what we are very proud of at the Nigerian Tulip International College.
“We appreciate the management so much and urge you to continue and equally aspire for more to raise the standard than where we are today. We are talking about two things. One is academics and the other is sport. Of course, academics will develop brains and sport will put the body in a proper shape. The combination of the two will produce cognitive learning. You cannot have an effective learning when the body is not in a good state; so sport is good for the body and it is equally good for learning.”
Aminu also said that NTIC was dedicated to unveiling talents in students, adding that the PTA was working with the school to help students to achieve their goals and become big.
He said, “Sport is a very big industry. It is a function of talent, and whoever has talent that can be developed can fit into it. This means that sport is a very big field for the students to earn a living and achieve all good things of life. Sport is a segment that we need to develop and bring up talents.
“NTIC has been a very good platform that encourages sports. We have field and different sporting facilities. This means that without coming to stadium, we still train talents in-house. Development should start from the school. Anything we are doing for the children today is to develop their talents. We are using this talents to develop talents.
“We as PTA, we go into the school and check the development of the school and work with the school to bring the best out of our children.”
At the event attended by students and their parents, who came to cheer their wards, Topaz House (yellow) defeated Emerald house (green).
Topaz House came tops as the overall best in all the track events with the leading points and also came out as the 3rd runner up in the match past.
Emerald House (green), the best defending champion, came second with 201 points and 1st in the match past, respectively.
The other defending champions, Ruby House (red) and Sapphire House (blue) also tried their best in the games.
Ruby House had a total of 145 points in the track events and came out as the second runner up in the match past while Sapphire House had a total of 135 points in the track events and came out as the first runner up in the match past.
Meanwhile, invited schools also excelled at the events as Providence International School came first in the girls’ track events while Julliard Academy came first in the boys’ track
events.
The best students in the sport activities for the day revealed that their passion for sport had pushed them to the finish line of success for their respective
houses.
The representative of the winning house (Topaz House), Abdulrasaq Lawal, said he loved sports and would want to build a bigger career in it as being done by the NTIC.
Likewise, Farouk Atanda, a representative of the house with the second position, Emerald House, said he planned to be a popular footballer in future.
Having won the track event for parents, wife of the former deputy managing director of the Sun Newspaper, Mrs. Toyin Nwosu, said sport had been her favourite right from time.
