United Bank for Africa (UBA) Plc recently sponsored two students to participate in the Certiport Worldwide competition on Microsoft Office in Anaheim, California, United States of America (USA), in line with its social responsibility initiatives and in continuous support of the enhancement of education.
This Certiport worldwide championship challenges students to demonstrate their proficiency in the use of Microsoft Word, Microsoft PowerPoint and Microsoft Excel.
The competition is open to all secondary school and university students in the Nigeria who are able to show proof of enrolment at an academic institution.
Olubunmi Agusto, sponsored by UBA to participate in the world championship for Microsoft Word, Excel and PowerPoint clinched the second position in the championships for Microsoft Word.
Olubunmi, who is just 15, came second to the winner, Dominique Howard of United States of America with Hannah Wilson of the United Kingdom, in third place. Olubunmi took home $2,500 in scholarships prize money for emerging second.
In the competition’s 13-year history, she is the first African to emerge among the top three. In the past, participants from Africa have come from Nigeria, South Africa, Cameroon, Uganda and Ghana on the world stage.
Olubunmi Agusto of Day Waterman College, Abeokuta, Ogun State and Adonijah Airede of Regent School, Abuja, FCT represented Nigeria at this year’s competition and both were sponsored by UBA.
The championship started with a pool of 400,000 participants around the world who took Microsoft Office Specialist certification. After competing in the national-level, 15 year-old Olubunmi and Adonijah Airede made it to the global stage with 123 finalists in Word, Excel and PowerPoint.
The finalists in Microsoft Word took a timed exam in which they had to recreate a Word document by following instructions. They were scored on accuracy and speed.
In one timed challenge, contestants were presented with an image of a Word document with an image of Saturn and other elements such as text boxes and tables.
They were asked the recreate the document with the same specifications, such as the same margins and horizontal and vertical height of each object. Contestants were tested in Microsoft Office Word 2007 and 2010.
The competition is an annual event. Already entries are being accepted for the 2014 competition which will start in November 2014 and last over a period of six months. The competition organized by Readmanna in Nigeria, will test Word, Excel, PowerPoint 2010 and 2013. The competition is open to all students aged between 13 and 22 years old.