The ManicaPost
Morris Mtisi
MUTARE Boys’ High School (MBHS) is the only boys-alone school in and around Mutare. It has produced heroes and celebrities in various walks of life, national stars in entertainment, sporting and academia. The boys from MBHS proudly represented by the lion (Shumba) which is a symbol of power and pride in the right sense) have ever been striving for excellence, not mediocrity.
This has not been as a result of idleness and celebrating historical successes, but innovative strategies to achieve and continue to achieve success in learning outcomes.
Recently David Marange (with Ernst & Young) in Harare and ….Mvenge (coordinator-Mutare Old Boys Trust) visited the Shumba boys on Career Guidance mission.
Mr Marange, is a Chartered Accountant with EY, former Coopers and Lybrand. He recently led a delegation of highly qualified accountants to educate the Shumba boys on what it takes for a student to prepare to secure a job with the highly reputable company of Chartered Accountants.( My readers can look forward to an exclusive interview with him made at Boys’ high on the day.)
Soft Skills Needed For One To Work At EY, one must:
1. Be a great communicator.
2. Be a self-starter.
3. Have a positive mindset.
4. Enjoy teamwork
5. Be flexible
6. Be a leader in the making
7. Have interest in project management.
It was interesting to hear the accountants say, ‘Audit, even forensic audit, must apply in our lives even outside a business context.’ It was for this reporter serious humour to hear one of them refer to marriage as a project which calls for serious forensic auditing before and from time to time during the relationship. How true it is! (Gwinyiso remene mani…Haleluyaa!).
“In EY we say, wherever you join, however long you stay, the exceptional EY experience lasts a lifetime,” they emphasized throughout the career guidance presentation.
The lesson learnt at Boys’ High School is one many schools and educationists in the education sector overlook or don’t see. Lumping or bundling thousands of Form 4 or 6 students in a football field or Show-grounds is not Careers Day. It is an undeclared student tourist resort where students conveniently find new boyfriends and girlfriends.
They are all on a date that day. Why? Simple! Because no one seems to realize that viewing inspecting career gazebos is not learning about new careers. Career guidance must assume a highly organized form where qualified and knowledgeable presenters educate students through serious but enjoyable academic presentations. Students must listen, ask questions, participate in discussion, think and be allowed to think, and think big.
And when all is done by not only experts in a particular career, but ones that are a schools’ former students, there cannot be a more effective and credible strategy of career guidance.
Other schools can learn from MBHS. Before the EY Chartered Accountants, there were lawyers; former students of the high school, engaging the Shumbas on the prospects of pursuing Law studies.
The incumbent headmaster at MBHS, Mr Matthew Tondoya, has quite a few ideas of administration that other heads can learn from.
For this writer and reporter, also himself an obsessed teacher of English Language, Literature and Communication Skills, it was not by arbitrary mistake that the number one soft skill required for one to join EY is for one to be a great communicator. That was a personal observation and point of significant interest. Work places are filled with poor communicators, who can hardly articulate everyday business to workmates, partners and customers; executive managers and directors in banks and other corporate companies, secretaries of all sorts…the list is inexhaustible of office holders who cannot talk, discuss, business impressively and intelligently. For teachers, sharp communication skills accentuate learning and outcomes in the classroom.
A teacher who is a poor communicator has no place in school and must stay away from students who want to pass examinations and prepare for a knowledge driven future. It can only be that plain or simple.
