ECL Awards N22.5m To Winners Of Secondary Schools Quiz, Debate Contest

The Education Champions League (ECL) has disbursed a total of N22.5 million in prize money to winners of its 2025 Quiz and Debate Competition for Secondary Schools, themed “Building Nigeria’s Future Leaders.”

The competition, which initially featured 34 secondary schools, was narrowed down to three finalists, Olive Shoots International School, Seacrest Preparatory School, and Federal Government Girls College (FGGC), Abuloma, who clinched the first, second, and third positions respectively.

Olive Shoots International School emerged overall champion, receiving a N15 million cash prize. Seacrest Preparatory School took second place with N5 million, while the defending champions, FGGC Abuloma, secured third position with N2.5 million.

The competition’s Best Debating Student, also from Olive Shoots International School, received a brand-new laptop as an additional award.

In his remarks, Chief Sody Peterside, chairman of the ECL Board of Trustees, said the initiative aims to nurture leadership qualities and inspire academic excellence among young Nigerians.

He noted that the ECL remains a beacon of hope and progress for the nation’s education system, reaffirming the League’s commitment to empowering students through healthy academic competition and capacity-building programmes.

In his words, “It is with great pride that I welcome you all to this year’s Education Champions League (ECL) Quiz competition, the largest education championship in Nigeria, with a total prize fund of 22.5 million naira.

“This event celebrates talent, dedication, and the transformative power of reading.

“The ECL stands as a beacon of hope and progress in our nation’s education system. Through its innovative competitions, quiz and debate events, it has tirelessly worked to rekindle the reading culture among young people, nurturing not just knowledge but also skills in comprehension, analysis, and communication. These traits will shape Nigeria’s future leaders and change-makers.

“Our mission is clear: to bridge gaps in quality interpersonal communication and nation-building by fostering a vibrant culture of reading and writing.”

Also speaking, ECL Board member, Dr. Lynn Ujiagbe, said the event was not just a contest, but a movement aimed at reviving and promoting literacy, fostering nation-building, and leaving a positive legacy for future generations.

She said, “Education Champions League is not just a competition, it is a movement, its a revival and we welcome you all to join us in this path towards positive change.

“We rest on four pillars, first of all to promote literacy, to encourage young people to align with books to discover the hidden treasures within, secondly, to participate in nation building, every one of us seated here is doing their bit right now to support education with competitions like this.

“Thirdly is to prove that such intellectual and academic related events can be sustained and finally, for posterity so that someday soon, one of these students would say because I was given the privilege to speak here, I’m building a career around public speaking, because I read books that were donated to our school libraries, I know more of Nigerian history and can be the change I want to see in the nation.”

Chairman of the event, Dr. Tombari Sibe, underscored the importance of education, noting that nations will naturally gravitate towards societies that prioritize learning, while citing ancient Egypt and Mali as examples of African civilizations built on strong educational foundations.

He commended the organisers for the competition and pledged his continued support for the programme.

“I want to first thank ECL for putting this together, every nation in history that has been known is because of their educational programmes,  because of the priority they place on education, either the regular educational institutions or even the ones that are not very regular as it is today.

“When Africa was known in the past, it was because Egypt was the cradle of civilization, some of the mathematical formulas we use today came out of Egypt, it is what constructed the pyramids, so because of the value they placed on education at that time, Egypt was known all over the world.

“Even our savior Jesus Christ visited Egypt, all of the philosophers you know, visited Egypt. If you think Egypt is too far away, come down a little bit to Mali, Timbuktu where there is arguably one of the oldest universities in the world, up until today, they are still getting very old intellectual materials of very rich content out of Mali.