{"id":529,"date":"2001-09-28T19:56:10","date_gmt":"2001-09-28T18:56:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/makeni.org.uk\/wordpress\/?p=529"},"modified":"2011-06-11T08:32:19","modified_gmt":"2011-06-11T07:32:19","slug":"529","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/makeni.org.uk\/wordpress\/2001\/09\/529\/","title":{"rendered":"30th graduation ceremony"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial;\">Herewith<\/span><span style=\"color: #008000; font-family: Arial;\"> a nice report from Mrs Allen about the Graduation Ceremony<\/span><span style=\"font-family: Arial;\"> held for our adult students on September 7th, which occasion was also  used to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the founding of the Centre.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: Arial;\"> <\/span><\/p>\n<p>The 30th Graduation Ceremony held on 7th September 2001 was a  very happy and colourful occasion. There were 70 graduates: 15 from the  Home Economics Department, 12 from the Agriculture General Department,  26 from the Agriculture Settlement Department and 17 from the  Electronics Department.<\/p>\n<p>Towards the middle of the year the students decided to organise  graduation gowns. The Executive Committee members suggested that the  graduation gowns be introduced next year since there was very little  time to organise the sewing of the gowns. They were adamant. A committee  of three lecturers and two representatives from the Home Economics,  Agriculture General and Settlement was formed. The result was that all  graduating students had gowns &#8212; different, of course, according to the  groups. The Home Economics students had black skirts, green blouses and  black shawls. The settlement students wore chitenge costumes and the  agriculture and electronics students had the gown, hood and cap.<\/p>\n<p>The organising committee requested that the ceremony be held outside  in the quadrangle. I pointed out that it is usually hot by 11.00 hrs. &#8221;  No problem,&#8221; came the reply. &#8220;One female student is married to an army  officer and he will provide three large tents.&#8221; Free of charge,  transport and workers provided! If MEC management had tried to organise  the tents I am certain that we would not have managed. I asked whether  maintenance workers should assist in carrying the chairs from the  Commonwealth Hall. That was not necessary either. I thought to myself  tomorrow will be a disaster. The tents were erected the day before; that  is 6th September. On the 7th September, the male students arranged the  chairs and tables, the female students arranged the flowers (roses  bought by the organising committee!) In no time the place was  transformed.<\/p>\n<p>The guest of honour, Dr Nkanza, Director General of the Technical  Education Vocational Entrepreneurship Training Authority (TEVETA)  arrived shortly before 10.00hrs accompanied by the Director Finance and  Administration, Mr Nataraaj. At 10.15 hrs the ceremony started. All the  graduating students were crowded in the Grade 3 and 4 classroom opposite  the open space. When the music started, they came out dancing led by  one lecturer. It was a beautiful sight. Since this was a surprise we did  not organise a video. Friends and relatives were invited to the  ceremony. Marketeers opposite the centre and passers-by came to see what  the loud music was all about. There was a large crowd. Speeches were  made and certificates and diplomas were presented.<\/p>\n<p>It turned out that the reason why the graduation ceremony was held  outside was that the Commonwealth Hall had been prepared for an end of  the year party. After the graduation ceremony, parents, friends,  relatives, invited guests and members of MEC staff were invited to the  party. I was not told how much each student contributed, but there was  plenty of food and soft drinks. The leftovers were taken to the  orphanage.<\/p>\n<p>It turned out to be a very pleasant 30th Anniversary celebration, all  organised by the students and members of staff from the Adult Education  department.. MEC did not spend a single ngwee towards it. I think this  was a wonderful gift from the students and staff, thanking MEC for the  thirty years of its existence. Unfortunately Fr Dil and Mrs Dil arrived  the day after. The tents had been removed and all the excitement had  died down. We had nothing to show for it except a few photographs of the  event!<\/p>\n<p><em> <\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>Christine Allen<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Herewith a nice report from Mrs Allen about the Graduation Ceremony held for our adult students on September 7th, which occasion was also used to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the founding of the Centre. The 30th Graduation Ceremony held &hellip; <a href=\"http:\/\/makeni.org.uk\/wordpress\/2001\/09\/529\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[79,49],"tags":[76,16],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/makeni.org.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/529"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/makeni.org.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/makeni.org.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/makeni.org.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/makeni.org.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=529"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"http:\/\/makeni.org.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/529\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":833,"href":"http:\/\/makeni.org.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/529\/revisions\/833"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/makeni.org.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=529"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/makeni.org.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=529"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/makeni.org.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=529"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}