Loyola Jesuit College
Motto | "Service of God and Others" |
---|---|
Type | Private, 6-year secondary |
Established | 1996 |
Affiliation | Jesuit (Catholic church) |
Principal | Joe-Stanis Okoye, S.J. |
Students | 600 |
Location | Gidan Mangoro, Karu LGA, Nasarawa, Abuja, Nigeria |
Campus | Urban, 70acres (0.29 km²) |
Colors | White and blue |
Mascot | Roaring Lion |
Website | loyolajesuit |
Loyola Jesuit College is a private, co-educational, boarding, secondary school in Gidan Mangoro outside FCT Abuja, Nigeria, operated by the Society of Jesus in the Roman Catholic church. The school was opened on October 2, 1996, and is named after the Society's founder, St. Ignatius of Loyola. The highly selective, six-year school has claimed the best results on the West African Examination Council (WAEC) examinations for the past seven years, as well as the best JAMB results for several of those years, and is thus regarded as the best in West Africa.[1][2][3]
Campus
Loyola Jesuit College is located on the outskirts of Abuja. It opened its gates on October 2, 1996. Funds to construct the school were provided by the Society of Jesus and benefactors in the United States, along with US$millions obtained through the USAID program ASHA.[4] College facilities include four large classroom and laboratory buildings, three dormitories accommodating 300 boys, one dormitory accommodating 300 girls, a chapel, dining hall, multi-purpose "Memorial" hall, Jesuit residence, and duplex bungalows for all the lay staff. The dormitories are Connelly, Loyola, Regis, and Xavier. Connelly is named after Cornelia Connelly, the founder of the Sisters of the Holy Child Jesus who are on the College staff. The names of the others come from the Jesuit saints Ignatius Loyola, John Francis Regis, and Francis Xavier.[5] The 70.4-acre (285,000 m2) campus is fenced to secure the safety of the students. Upon entering the LJC campus via the front gates, a statue of St. Ignatius of Loyola is seen presenting his knightly sword to the Lord, to become a Cabellero de Cristo, "Knight for Christ."
Admissions
Loyola Jesuit College is one of the most academically selective secondary schools in Nigeria, but welcomes boys and girls of all faiths. In the year 2010, 5000 wrote the school entrance exam and LJC accepted 100, or 2% of its applicants. It is one of the first schools in Nigeria to implement a strictly online application policy. Prospective students both apply online and receive their results online.[6] LJC does not accept transfers: students must enter the school into First Year.
Student activities
The college supports dozens of organized student activities. According to the college's website, "Loyola Jesuit College has broad goals for the development of its students: some of those goals are fostered by the academic program, but many of those goals are fostered only outside the classroom, through the school's extracurricular and formational programs." The school is one of the most noted in the annual Cowbell Mathematics Competition.
Student groups & programs
Most of the groups at Loyola Jesuit College were formed and are run by the students themselves.
- The Roar is a student magazine published from the Gidan Mangoro campus since 2000. Editorial positions are held by students at the school.
- The Loyola Union is dedicated to keeping the memory of the Sixty Angels alive. It produces the annual Loyola Jesuit College drama which includes Hopes of the Living Dead, a tragedy by Ola Rotimi, Hard Ground by Ahmed Yerima, and Dance on His Grave by Barclays Anyakorama.
- The Service Programme organized by students helps children in the area of Gidan Mangoro and its president is Chibuzo Akpe
- The Prison Journal is a student newspaper that was launched in October 2010 to cover college news.
- The Blue Steel is an intra-school, student-organized, soccer tournament in the college. The students form teams named after European clubs and/or National teams and play in a Champions League-style tournament. The current president is Ebube Umeano.
- The Golden Rims is a basketball tournament in the college where the students form teams and take up names of existing American NBA teams.
- The Concerned Students International is an advocacy group that formed after the December 2005 Sosoliso plane crash. It hopes to get 60 prominent Nigerians to sign an advocacy commitment to ensure a safer, better future for Nigerians.
- The LJC Band is a mostly male group who play different drums during assemblies, ceremonies, inter-school competitions, etc.
- The LJC Dance Troupe is an amazingly talented group of dancers who perform for the school at various events and ceremonies.
- The LJC Accapella Troupe is a stunning group of talented and innovative vocalists who perform on various occasions for the school.
- The LJC Altar Servers Association ("the squad") are boys and girls selected to minister on the altar in the Chapel of the Good Samaritan. It is a highly selective and respected association.
- The LJC Dancers in the liturgy Association is a Christian student association made up of selective dancers who portray exquisite skill in learning, adapting, and presenting traditional dances on occasion during Sunday masses in Chapel.
- CFC/ C-Boys are two branches from Connelly House. The C-Boys consists the boys from SS1, SS2 and some important SS1 boys. The CFC consists all Connelly ss1 girls. They are also known as the Greenhouse effect. These two branches are known as the "squads" of the house and are one of the two biggest house generated squads in the school. They are both popurlarly known amongst students of the college.
- Loyola Girls: lets not forget the Loyola girls, the noisiest squad in the college. Also known as "LGs", it consists of basically all Loyola house girls. We don't know what they plan privately but they usually do crazy stuff in public. We love them though; they add something to the liveliness of the college.
- Soccer Girls a group or team of wonderful, talented young ladies who will stop at nothing in their pursuit for success, whether it is during trading or the Loyola Cup, they always try to put in their best. They will miss their former captain Urenna Evuleocha, whom they miss dearly as she graduated in the class of 2015.
Tragic flight claims student lives
At first students from Port Harcourt travelled between school and their homes via buses on the roads. Rising crime along roads during the 1990s made parents believe that road travel was too dangerous. In 2001, when Sosoliso Airlines began services between Port-Harcourt and Abuja, parents placed their children on the flights.[7]
On December 10, 2005, Loyola Jesuit College lost 60 students in the crash of Sosoliso Airlines Flight 1145. Among the many students who lost their lives was a family of three siblings and the Head Boy of the school at the time. The crash claimed 107 lives with two survivors, one of whom was Kechi Okwuchi, a student at Loyola Jesuit. Kechi was treated at Milpark Hospital in Johannesburg, South Africa,[8] and at Shriners Hospitals for Children in Galveston, Texas, United States.[9] A new multi-purpose auditorium, Memorial Hall, was built in memory of the students who died in the crash.[10][11]
Administration
Presidents
|
Principals
|
Vice Principal-Student Life
- Mr. Orji
- Mr. Espedis
- Mr Enokela (interim)
- Mr. Paulinus
- Br. Patrick
- Sr. Tina Chikezie)
Alumni
Loyola Jesuit College graduates have been accepted in top universities around the world. This includes Ivy League colleges in the U.S. such as Princeton University, Harvard University, Yale University, University of Pennsylvania, Columbia University, and Cornell University, as well as Massachusetts Institute of Technology, The Johns Hopkins University, Stanford University, Georgetown University, University of Notre Dame, Georgia Institute of Technology, Purdue University, Illinois Institute of Technology, California Institute of Technology, Fairfield University, Boston University, Fordham University, Northeastern University, West Virginia University, Drexel University, Oklahoma State University, Howard University, Texas Southern University, University of Toronto, University of British Columbia, University of Waterloo, University of Nottingham, University College London, University of Edinburgh, Cambridge University, Oxford University, Imperial College London, Canisius College, London School of Economics, University of Ibadan, University of Nigeria Nsukka, Obafemi Awolowo University, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, University of Lagos,California Polytechnic State University.
Notable Alumni
- Emmanuel Bez Idakula, singer, songwriter
- Nmachi Jidenma, founder of blog CP-Africa.com
Coordinates: 4°55′37.9″N 6°58′0.76″E / 4.927194°N 6.9668778°E
Notes
- ↑ "Welcome to Loyola Jesuit College." Loyola Jesuit College. Retrieved on 12 September 2011.
- ↑ Musa, Illiyasu. "Why the current reforms in education sector, by Education Minister." Nigerian Newsday. Tuesday 20 December 2005. Retrieved on 12 September 2011.
- ↑ "Entrance examination into JS 1 2012 - 2013." Retrieved on 12 September 2011.
- ↑ Funding
- ↑ "School Life." Loyola Jesuit College. Retrieved on 4 February 2012.
- ↑ Admissions
- ↑ Michaels, Daniel. "How Blunders and Neglect Stoked an African Air Tragedy." The Wall Street Journal. 1 October 2007. Retrieved on 11 June 2012. - Available from ProQuest, document ID: 399047247
- ↑ "Crash Survivor in S/African Hospital, Mother Speaks," This Day
- ↑ "Enter the Den 2007-2008," Loyola Jesuit College
- ↑ "Kechi Okwuchi". Various Sources. 2005-12-10.
- ↑ Africa's Airline Casualties on YouTube The Wall Street Journal