CAN WE JUST SCRAP 8AM. CLASSES IN LASU? HEAR ME OUT!

This is me waking up lazily from my bed around 6:05 am in the morning while half-consciously searching for the alarm to shut off the ear- piercing ring emanating from it. Torture is an understatement for such moments. Gone are the beautiful scenes in the dreamland. Then boom, reality hits; I have a class by 8:00 a.m. Getting out of bed takes another ten minutes but I finally accomplish this task, knowing my day has officially began. This is my cross. I must carry it regardless because it’s the life I chose: THE LIFE OF A SCHOLAR.

While preparing for school, I keep laying silent curses on the person who invented 8am classes. How inconsiderate of him/her!! If I were to meet with that person, my question will be, “What joy did you derive from doing such?”

Let me shift attention away from myself and make a brief introduction of the subject at hand. Early morning lectures have actually been a long standing tradition in LASU ever since its establishment in 1983. Waking up to go to school as early as 6:00 a.m in preparation for a lecture scheduled 8:00 a.m was something students in those days didn’t really look forward to but were left with no option than to conform with.

Life in Nigeria was a bit soft then. There was little or no security risk that came with treading the streets of Lagos at such early hours of the morning. Traffic congestion was also minimal due to high level of discipline displayed by motorists and which was proudly implemented by the military regime. In short, students didn’t have much to worry about outside academics. But alas, the situation of things in the country has taken a drastic downturn over the years. In essence,things are not the same way they used to be like in the days of old.

The porous and fragile nature of the nation’s security is alarmingly skyrocketing, making it unlike anything the country has ever seen before. With security problems come transportation risks, as the roads are not safe for plying due to the activities of Men of the Underworld, not also forgetting the deplorable conditions most road networks are in. The question on the lips of I and majority of Lasuites is that with the nature of things in the country, are 8:00 a.m classes worth risking our lives for?

The set of students worst hit by the plague of early morning classes are students living off campus, and sadly, I fall within this category. Many students have hostels situated as far as Iyana-Ipaja, Egbeda, Agege, Ikeja and places far beyond. They have to get up as early as possible, having eaten little or no food, to fight for a seat in a public bus as it’s the Almighty rush hours. I also have to make silent prayers that the bus I’m about to board isn’t one of the notorious _’one chance buses’._ If the Devil wants to add to the already annoying stage performance, he throws in a little scene of traffic congestion and by the time I eventually arrive at the campus, it’s either the 8:00 a.m class has ended already or the lecturer is no longer allowing latecomers into the classroom or in the worst possible scenario, the lecturer doesn’t show up at all. This now leaves me wondering about the essence of waking up early when I will most likely miss the class.

There are days when I’m lucky and fortunate enough to make it to the 8:00 a.m lectures. As expected, I end up half-sleeping throughout the lecture time-frame and experience delirium due to lack of adequate sleep and fatigue from the physical exertion involved in coming down to the campus.

This gradually affects my physical and mental health and causes a reduction in grades at the end of the semester because even though I attended the class, there’s nothing a semi- conscious student like me can be able to comprehend at those moments.

I gradually become a shadow of myself and become incapable of executing simple daily tasks successfully.

With all that has been said, almost everyone who’s experiencing the same as I would agree that 8:00 a.m classes have outlived their usefulness and have thus become almost irrelevant. The School Management should endeavour to work towards resetting daily lecture timetables across all faculties in such a manner that all lectures begin from 9:00 a.m. This will be a welcome development towards making students breath normally again and will ease off the burden that comes with 8:00 a.m classes.

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