Best Student to Get $1000 in UBA National Essay Writing Competition

United Bank for Africa, Uganda(UBA) has said it seeks to enhance communication skills as well as encouraging competition through its national essay writing competition.

“We believe that such competitions will help to enhance students’ communication and expression skills not only at school but wherever they go. We want to do our bit to encourage our youths to improve their communication skills. If you are not able to express yourself and also communicate well, you will have a difficult future,” said Chioma Mang, the UBA Uganda Managing Director.

“We are very concerned about Africa and pride ourselves in Africanism that we believe the future of Africa is in our hands. We want to ensure that by the time students finish school, they are able to express themselves better and boldly speak.”

The UBA boss was on Wednesday speaking during the launch of the national essay writing competition targeting secondary school students from senior one to senior six.

Chioma explained that through the competition, students will be encouraged to improve their writing and communication skills in general and this will greatly benefit them not only at school but also in future when they join the employment world.

According to Mary Angella Naddamba, an official from the government secondary school department in the Ministry of Education and Sports, the reading and writing culture has of late gone down in schools.

“Essay writing promotes a culture of reading and writing which has been a gap. We want writing and reading to get to the bottom in senior one up to senior six. Learners must express themselves very well and one of the ways is such essay writing competitions,”Naddamba said.

“Writing enhances positive learning outcomes and apart from getting distinctions, it helps one to be able to express themselves and communicate effectively.”

The official from the Education Ministry noted that in order to enhance reading and writing skills among learners, the new lower secondary and the abridged curriculums emphasized the same.

“Such a competition will be a means of opening global opportunities to the learners, teachers and schools.”

The competition

According to officials from the bank, the UBA national essay writing competition will draw participants from all parts of the country.

Participants who are secondary school students will be required to submit handwritten essays of not more than 750 words on the topic; “How did the COVID -19 pandemic affect you and what were your biggest lessons from it?”

The top 10 essays will go for the second round of competition to write supervised essays from which the best three essays will be rewarded.

The winner will get $1000, a laptop and a certificate whereas the two runners-up will each get a laptop and a certificate.

Also, the 10 finalists will each get a certificate.

A team of judges led by Eve Nabulya from the Makerere University department of literature, Dr.Joel Isabirye from Kampala International University and Lilian Lyavaala from Uganda Christian University in Mukono will adjudicate the competition that will climax on September 9 2022.