The ManicaPost
Morris Mtisi
In the 2019 Grade 7 final examination rankings, with a whopping 100 percent pass rate, MCS came out number 13 in Zimbabwe. The school is growing from strength to strength and heading for stardom.
Speaking at the 2019 Speech and Prize Giving Day, the owner and director of Manicaland Christian School, Mr Gumisai Mawadzi, thanked the parents and his teaching staff for a job well done and for the support.
“For the past four years we have been hitting the 100 percent pass rate mark in the Grade 7 final examinations. I must acknowledge it is not about me alone, but the support the school enjoys from parents, learners and teachers,” he said.
In his brief speech, the Seventh Day Adventist entrepreneur and educationist pointed out several maxims he believed guided the school’s vision of 21st century education.
“First, you are worth your network. This means every individual is who he or she is because of whom one spends time with. The same with your children! They must understand whom they mix with. If they spend their time with lazy friends who hate reading, so will they be lazy and haters of reading,” he said. “If they spend time with foul-mouthed friends, they speak vulgar language wherever they are.”
He pointed out the need for the school to develop competent learners who are wide awake to the demands of 21st century education . . . learners who are focused, purposeful and knowledgeable.
Mr Mawadzi promised parents to continue to produce pupils with confidence in everything they do. He expressed a passion to produce world-class public speakers and leaders.
“Life demands more than 5 units. Yes, we work hard to produce the best examination results, and thank God we are doing just that as seen by our yearly 100 percent pass rates…and this year we are number 13 in the country. But there is much more an examination does not tell about a child.
He ended his speech by thanking parents for their support of the school which he testified was now growing extremely fast.
On the same occasion, Pastor Aaron Rusikira, the guest of honour at the event that combined with the ECD B Graduation Ceremony emphasised that children were gifts from God. Aptly reading from Psalm 127, the guest speaker who is more familiar with television/radio evangelism than grandstanding secular podiums, soon started to burn with evangelical fire. He was on point and not taking anyone by force.
“Behold children are a gift from God. The fruit of the womb is a reward . . . (verse 3 to 5)” In clear theological erudition punctuated and accentuated by highly metaphorical parallels and interpretations, Pastor Aaron Rusikira was very different from the Biblical Aaron(Moses’ brother) who was handicapped with his tongue and speech.
Pastor Aaron left listeners glued to the edges of their seats when he unpacked the metaphorical significance of the arrow. “It is straight. It is targeted.
“The distance of the arrow is determined by the intensity of the pull. So if children be arrows, they need to be straight, to be targeted and could only be effective and efficient if the parents make an intense pull,” he said in deep biblical proverbial wisdom.
“Arrows unlike other weapons like swords, knives, knobkerries (clubs), guns reach distances the person using the bow does not get to. As parents likewise, we post our children into the distant future . . . where we cannot get,” Aaron continued unaided by Moses.
“All I am saying here is ‘choose your school wisely.’ Arrows are stored in a quiver. And straight children like straight arrows are kept in a straight school. And Manicaland Christian School is a straight, safe, appropriate place to keep your children. If the quiver (the school) is bent, the arrows cannot be straight.
“They will conform to the shape of the quiver and be bent. And bent or crooked arrows do not shoot straight they miss the target,” Aaron went on and on unpacking the scriptures with divine intelligence, succinctness and appropriateness.
“The two quivers are the school and the home. But remember it is the first quiver…the school where children spend most of their time. That is how significant school is . . . the right school is.”
Pastor Rusikira prayerfully concluded his thundering and to-the-point speech by a word a wish for blessings from the Almighty.
He was prophetic when he said he saw the establishment of a boarding school at MCS soon.
“God bless your arrows so that children remain in the right quiver for a longer time.”
The Manica Post celebrates with MSC in all its successes and promises to continue to write good stories about them
