184 N’Delta youths on secondary scholarship moved to varsity grant

No fewer than 184 secondary school students that enjoyed NNPC/Shell Cradle-to-Career (C2C) scholarships have been migrated to the SPDC JV university scholarship programme in the last five years.

The Shell’s Head of Corporate Relations for Nigeria, Igo Weli, who stated this, added that the beneficiaries are all from the company’s areas of operations in the Niger Delta.

A statement today from Shell’s Media Relation Manager, Abimbola Essien-Nelson, said Weli spoke at a graduation ceremony at Bloombreed High School in Rivers State, where he pointed out that the C2C scholarship is a flagship intervention programme by SPDC and its joint venture partners to bridge the socio-economic gap in education among youths in the Niger Delta.

He mentioned other partner schools to include Arch-Deacon Brown Educational Centre, Jephthah Comprehensive College and Brookstone Secondary School.

About 60 C2C scholars from four of the partner private secondary schools in Rivers State graduated on the occasion, while Weli was represented by the company’s Social Performance and Social Investment Manager, Mr Emmanuel Anyim.

Weli said, “These beneficiaries are among the 708 youths from the Niger Delta who have benefited from the Cradle-to-Career (C2C) scholarship since inception in 2010,”

He explained that the C2C scholarship would provide full scholarship to each student covering tuition, accommodation, books, clothes, toiletries, medical insurance and visiting care for the six years of secondary school and is targeted at brilliant children from Niger Delta with underprivileged background.

He said, “We are proud of the success of the Cradle-to-Career scholarship programme which seeks to provide quality secondary education to brilliant students from rural public schools in remote communities of SPDC’s operational areas in the Niger Delta. We are pleased that the C2C has been consistent since it began in 2010.”

The statement added that “Shell Companies in Nigeria have a history of supporting education through scholarships and other initiatives. In 2021, the SPDC JV and SNEPCo invested $6.2m in scholarships.

“Since 2016, the SPDC JV and SNEPCo scholarship programmes have awarded more than 2,500 secondary school grants, over 3,200 university grants and 900 Cradle-to-Career scholarship grants to students. SNEPCo also runs a C2C programme pan Nigeria.”