Joseph Osei-Owusu, the First Deputy Speaker of Parliament, has challenged students of Juaben Senior High School (SHS), his alma mater, to work hard to win the National Science and Mathematics Quiz (NSMQ) and the Senior High Schools Debates Competitions, this academic year.

As his personal contribution to meet that challenge, he pledged to support the budget they would require to achieve the feat.

He reminded the students to dream big - strive for higher laurels.

“It’s the performance of students that makes schools famous and not just the sheer name of the school,” the First Deputy Speaker, who is also the Member of Parliament (MP) for Bekwai, added.

He said the time had come for the school that produced the likes of himself, the MP for Adansi Asokwa, Mr. K T Hammond, and many others to be counted among the best academic institutions in the country.

He was interacting with students of the SHS, who were on a familiarization visit to Parliament.

He asked that they applied themselves to the opportunities that the school offered them – to make maximum use of the little resources at their disposal.

He encouraged them to cultivate the habit of reading novels and story books irrespective of their courses, telling them that, "every knowledge you seek is in the book".

Reading, he said, would help them to learn fast and attain their life goals.

Mr. Osei-Owusu took them through the parliamentary proceedings and the oversight functions of the legislature.

Parliament provides a platform for the people’s representatives to debate all national issues and not just law making.

Mr. Richard Amponsah, the Government Subject Teacher of the SHS, said the school, which won the National Science Engineering Quiz competition in the past, was motivated by the First Speaker’s challenge to work harder for greater laurels.

He expressed confidence that the school would emerge among the top three of the NSMQ competition.

The students assured the First Deputy Speaker that they would go the extra mile to win the quiz and the debate finals.