Batangtoru, 27 April 2017— Hundreds of students from various schools in Batangtoru and Muara Batangtoru sub district enlivened the Batangtoru Student Festival 2017 event held by Martabe Gold Mine at SMAN 1 Batangtoru on April, 26-27, 2017. The annual event held for the second time is one of the initiatives of PT Agincourt Resources, the operator of Martabe Gold Mine in raising up the quality of education in Batangtoru and Muara Batangtoru.
Spokesperson for PT Agincourt Resources, Katarina Hardono stated that the festival was aimed to motivate the students to pursue higher education up to university level to increase the quality of the education of Batangtoru and Muara Batangtoru citizens.
“Last year, the first Batangtoru Student Festival of Student attained great response from the people of Batangtoru and this year we reorganized the event in order to increase the quality of education of the students here,” Katarina said.
Katarina reiterated that the Student Festival is an opportunity for students in Batangtoru and Muara Batangtoru and the surrounding area to share, to learn together and to compete as well. “It can be a friendship moment between junior and senior students and also a forum to show the spirit of competing through various events of the competition,” she said. In addition, Katarina said this event can be pageant great opportunity to explore the potential talent of the students.
The main thing of this event according to Katarina, is to introduce and explain to the students a number of higher educational institutions in Padangsidimpuan and Medan. By knowing the various majors at the university level, it is hoped that the students will be motivated to gain a higher education.
“The Student Festival 2017 will focus the educational vision by putting more attention on the preparedness and self-confidence of the students at Batangtoru and Muara Batangtoru and surrounding area to gain a better education which will be great for their future,” Katarina explained.
There were several events held at the Student Festival. For instance the university entrance examination Try Out which was followed by around 200 students of third grade senior high school. This activity was held by collaboration with Ganesha Operations, the biggest tutorial institution in Indonesia. Other events included the educational exhibitions by number of universities and non-formal institutional education, such as UMTS, STAIN, UGN, ITM, Ganesha Operation and Togu English and Computer.
In addition, a number of senior high schools enlivened the exhibition, such as SMAN 1, SMKN 1 Batangtoru, SMKN 2 Batangtoru, SMKN 1 Muara Batangtoru and Madrasah Aliyah NU Batangtoru. The exhibition was supported by Gramedia Medan Book Store, Erlangga Padangsidempuan and Bagasta, a local food producer. Meanwhile the competitions that were held included English speech contest, spelling bee competition, recycling competition, talent show with dancing, singing, drama and stand up comedy as well as basket ball 3 on 3, etc.
At the peak of the event, the winners were announced for the clean and healthy school competition 2017 towards Adiwiyata Standard for elementary school, junior high school and senior high school. The scoring criteria was based on the eight health and hygiene behaviours implemented by the school.
For the level of elementary school, the winner was SD Negeri 100707 Perkebunan Batangtoru, followed by SD Swasta 100910 Faza Azkiya of Hutaraja sub-district, as the runner up and SD Negeri 100720 Hapesong Baru as the third winner. Meanwhile for the junior and senior high school level, the first winner was SMA Negeri 1 Batangtoru, followed by SMP Negeri 2 Batangtoru as the runner up and SMK Negeri 1 Muara Batangtoru as the third winner. The prize money included IDR 35 million for first place, while the runner up and the third place received IDR 27.5 million and IDR 15 million respectively.
The program combined the achievement of the healthy and hygienic life style program launched by Ministry of Health and Adiwiyata program launched by Ministry of Environment in order to create a conducive school atmosphere as a venue to study as well as to empower the school students to be active in creating a healthy environment.
