Growing up in an African home can indeed be very tiring and tasking at the same time, growing up amidst them again can seem to be a challenge because right from your childhood days your neighbours have started calling you Doctor, some will call you Lawyer or better still engineer. If you would agree with me, you know growing up, your African parent wanted either of those three for you, only a well educated African parent would go as far as calling you a pilot or a banker.
The believe then was that those professions were the most respected and recognized in the Society, of course every mother wants to be labelled the mother of a Doctor or Engineer.
Now imagine getting to the senior secondary school and what you have passion for is Mass Communication, you go home to tell your parents that you want to study mass communication which you are passionate about they might end up discouraging you while some will even change the course of your life by force and channel it their own way by telling you to study medicine or forget schooling.
Putting tertiary institution students on a scale of 1-100, I wouldn't be surprised if 70% of them are studying what their parents want and not what they are passionate about. Some people study their course because of money, some peer pressure, some people because of what people will think of them.
All this things should not be in the 21st century because it is only when you discover yourself that you would be able to deliver. One of the major reason why people do not read again is because they are not comfortable with what they are studying. On many occasions I have heard tertiary institution students say "let me just graduate and give them(parent) the certificate they paid for after which I will do what I want to do".
Do what you are passionate about so that you will leave a long lasting impression in your generation. Say no to peer pressure in choosing course of study. Parents should support the dreams of their children and not channel the course if their wards life the way Mother 'A' did hers.
Writer: Omolola Adeboye Adekunle (B.Sc Mass Communication)
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