THE Kilakila Secondary School Deputy Principal (students Services) has urged the Department of Education to work with the Office of Censorship and include other schools in the censorship awareness program.
Ms Pala Balun told this paper that Kilakila Secondary School is currently piloting the Censorship Ambassadors School Program and she has received positive feedbacks from students.
“From what I know, Kilakila is Piloting this program, so I believe the department should support the censorship board and take it to all levels of education,” Balun said.
She said most students do not know what censorship is and what type of information should be censored.
Balun said in today’s generation it is surprising to see that a student at a young age can knows so much negativity from the internet or from viewing films.
Vice-head boy Yamba Nato also raised similar concerns stating that it was a must that all schools in the country need to take part in this program.
“It is helpful and I think that if we continue doing this, most students will change, and also they can go back and spread what they have learnt and teach their families,” Nato said.
“So instead of targeting youths on the streets, target schools as they can learn and advocate their peers wherever they go. In that way we can change the mindsets of our youths.”
The student began their awareness session to the 32 classes of the school on Monday.
The awareness starts from 2:20pm to 3:20pm during the study period of the whole school and will conclude these sessions on the 4th week of school.
The student ambassadors, upon completion of the three-day workshop undertaken in June last year, were tasked to advocate and represent the Censorship values of self-respect and human decency to their respective areas of influence which are their homes, school and their communities.
So far, the awareness sessions were carried out to grade 12 and grade 10 classes on Monday, while grade 9 awareness was carried out on Wednesday and the grade 7 and 8 classes will undergo similar sessions on Friday.
Both Balun and Nato expressed that the program is helpful to the students as most of them do not know what the Office of Censorship is all about.
“Before taking part in this program, I had no idea of the office and its responsibilities. But know I understand and know that it has a big role to play,” Nato added.