By Chisom Nwatu
UBA Foundation, the corporate social responsibility arm of the United Bank for Africa Plc, has commenced the 2022 edition of its ‘National Essay Competition’ in Nigeria with a call for entries.
The competition is part of UBA Foundation’s education initiative aimed at promoting literacy, and encouraging healthy and intellectual competition among senior secondary school students in Nigeria and across the African continent.
 A statement by UBA said that this year’s essay competition, the 12th edition, would witness increased participation of students from senior secondary schools across Nigeria, “who are now able to submit their entries with ease from the comfort of their homes or schools through the UBAF NEC digital submission portal”.
The statement said the essay topic for this year is ‘ASUU strikes have often cost Nigerian students time. Advise the Nigerian government on how they can reach an agreement with ASUU to improve tertiary education in the country’.
It said for the past three years, UBA Foundation has been reviewing the prizes upwards to reflect economic realities and inflationary effects.
This year, the first prize winner will receive an educational grant of N5m to study at any African university of their choice, up from the N3.5m in 2021. Similarly, the second and third prizes now stand at N3m and N2.5m educational grants, rising from N2.5m and N2m, respectively.
Also, winners of the 12 best essays will go home with brand new laptops and other educational tools to help them with their tertiary research work and other studies.
Bola Atta, chief executive officer, UBA Foundation, said with the digital submission portal, more students in secondary schools across the country would have the opportunity to scan and send in their entries and compete to win educational grants for study at any university of their choice on the African continent.
 “Over time, we have worked hard to ensure that our UBA Foundation programmes continue to impact lives in meaningful ways. We realize that the use of technologically driven initiatives is part of the modern day and we would like to reach students in their comfort zones,” Atta said.
