It was a day of excitement and inspiration as the Tera Academy For The Arts, TAFTA held her second graduation ceremony for 16,766 students how had completed their training programmes at the different stations of the Academy across Nigeria.
The remarkable feat was possible because of the incredible support and partnership TAFTA enjoys from the Mastercard Foundation; A Foundation that is deeply committed to the empowerment of young entrepreneurs across Nigeria, particularly in the creative industry, as part of their Young Advocates strategy.
The event marks a astonishing moment in the journey of two oragnisations, that have shared values of innovation and pushing boundaries.
Speaking at the ceremony which held at the Tera Kulture on Victoria Island, Bolanle Austen-Peters, Founder of TAFTA it has been nothing but transformational journey from setting up Tera Kulture, BAP Productions.
She opined that experience and its struggles gave birth to TAFTA and seeing the graduating students walk through the doors just speaks to the remarkable work that is going on changing the lives of young people.
“We are always in motion at Tera Kulture, at BAP Productions we are always doing things breaking new grounds, so, I never had time to sit back and internalize and reflect on the things we are achieving.
Those children walking through the doors today just mean so much, we have learnt a lot putting Tera Kulture together, BAP, the stage plays, and it was absolutely important for me to get what I have learnt out to the public.
It a struggle to get that knowledge for me, with all I have learnt I was clear I wanted others to have access to it; watching those young people as I was walking in and saying this is really changing lives and its unbelieveable”.
For Mastercard Foundation it has been a remarkable journey of transforming and changing the lives of young people, and that Mastercard is proud and excited about outcomes of its partnership with Bolanle Austen-Peters’ Tera Academy For The Arts.(TAFTA)
“When the partnership with the Tera Culture, Academy for the Arts, and the Mastercard Foundation began in 2002, a target was set to reach 65,000 young women and men over five years.
I had like to commend Bolanle Austen-Peters and her entire team at TAFTA for the remarkable progress we have made since TAFTA began. Over 18,000 participants have completed the program so far, and we have graduated 16,766 students from cohorts 2, 3, 4, and 5.
Today is a very special day for so many young people, as we celebrate this remarkable milestone in the journey of these talented individuals graduating today.
I feel a deep sense of pride as we commemorate the graduation of so many students, and I can only imagine how proud we all must be”.
She however charged the graduating trainees to not relent but stay focus on their dreams. Pointing out that its worthy on note that a high percentage of the graduating trainees are young women and that excites the foundation.
In her words: “What is particularly inspiring about this graduating cohort is the significant representation of young women among the graduates.
Out of the 16,766 individuals receiving their certificates today, an impressive 9,219 are young women. This is a testament to the untapped potential and extraordinary talents that exist within our female youth population. And it underscores the value of our Young Advocates strategy.
To the graduates here today, your dedication, perseverance, and hard work have brought you this far, and you really should be immensely proud of your achievements. Through the skills you’ve gained through this program, you have an opportunity to leave a mark. Whether it’s in script writing, stage design, lighting, animation, sound or the business of creatives, the world is waiting for you to take up your space.
Each and every one of you has the potential to become a catalyst for economic growth. As you embark on the next phase of your journey, I encourage you to remain resilient, adaptable, and determined in the pursuit of your dreams”, Reeta Roy concluded.
For ageless and award winning thespian Joke Silva this is the beginning of a forward learning journey for the TAFTA grandaunts, who she admonished to be humble and dedicated to their crafts, own it and be the best at it that the sky is wide enough for all birds to fly. But they must pay attention also to a key element of the creative industry collaboration.
“The way to survive is by collaboration. You are in an industry that says bring the lighter, the writer, the actor, the cameraman, the stage manger and you form a company and you start doing your work. And you in an age where there is much need and demand for content, if you do the work well you will never be out work”.
Joke Silva, however threw a word of caution at the TAFTA trainees: “Be humble you are just starting. Start out being ready to do anything you are asked to do except if it is morally wrong. Be ready to do the work and I wish you all the best”.
A key Highlight of the ceremony was the dance play performance written directed and preformed by the graduating students, that not only got a standing applause from the audience, but also drew the admiration of Prof Folasade ogunsola, the vice-chancellor of the University of Lagos.
Delivering her address at the event, Prof Ogunsola said Nigeria’s youth population is the key to changing the narrative and powering the African renaissance. Stating that the creative mind of the average youth in this age and what it is capable of is unimaginable.
“First of all for I think for them to have taken these courses tells you about the kind of people they are, they are people who are already thinking about their goals, thinking about their future. So, what we need to do is encourage them, encourage them because there would be failures along the way, failure is not a tragedy, what you do with failure is you learn from it and move on in another direction because what it tells you is that’s not the way to go.
So, what we want to see is people supporting them to remain resilient, because they would need to build resilience. I see these people as people who have taken the first step in investing in themselves; so, when we have institutions such as Tera Kulture with the TAFTA we are doing is developing the various type of talents that exist”.
Prof Ogunsola postulated that one of the positives of the PAFTA initiative is that it is changing the narrative that everyone has to go to study at a conventional university.
She says the TAFTA: “It is also telling us that everyone does not have to go to the conventional universities for them to become who they will become. For if we think about why we have universities is to develop manpower for development and it can come from various areas; and we within the traditional university system recognize the amount of expertise outside our doors and we are already collaborating with that kind of expertise.
“I am looking forward to a really great future where we are really developing and up scaling our young people”.
The Unilag vice-chancellor pour encomium on the founder of TAFTA Bolanle Austen-Peters for the extraordinary work is doing with the unflinching support from Mastercard Foundation.
“She shouldn’t stop this is the beginning and she needs to make it bigger, and we hope that she will be a role model for others to spring up from.
Because at the end of the day what we are trying to develop are experts in their fields and you don’t have to go through a particular route. We, need to start to recognise these kinds on of academies and have more, Nigerians and our youths are very creative so we need to creative the expertise for them to grow.
And have those in this business for a long time to help them through to become even greater than them. So, we need to raise those kinds of shoulders and reward such academies appropriately”.
