The Power of Being Informed

"The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing." - Edmund Burke

It is important to stay informed and knowledgeable about the world in order to take action and make a positive impact. By being informed, you are better equipped to make informed decisions and take meaningful action in your community and beyond.

We live in time where information is readily available everywhere. With your phone or tablet can just click on online and search for information to know what is going on in your country, region and the world. Technology has made it so easy that everything is at your finger tips.

With a few mouse clicks, I browse on the BBC website and showed the news of the earthquake in Turkey to my uncles and aunties at my village and they were shocked at the massive damage the earthquake is causing.

The internet was recently introduced to my country in the early 1990’s However, widespread access to the internet only became available in the early 2000s. It was initially limited to urban areas and major institutions and expanded to cover more rural areas as well. However, most of us could not access the internet services because of its high cost and lack of infrastructure and financial resources. At that time, owning a mobile phone is a luxury so you can just imagine the cost of it.

But things have changed a lot now and we could not ask for a better time than today as it’s easy to access the internet and navigate to find information that you want.

My observations have led me to believe that so many students in my country have no idea on what is actually going on. But you can see them on Facebook, tiktok and most of them would spend much of their time playing PubG and commenting on the meme pages rather than using their access to technology to take note and aware themselves on the happenings around them. It seems that they have been using the internet for all the wrong reasons. An observation that has a lot of truth in it!

A classic example is climate change will have far-reaching impacts on our pacific islands especially on our low-lying atolls and students today will be the ones most affected by these changes in the future. They will be the ones inheriting the consequences of the decisions that are made now. But do they know about Climate Change? Its impact and consequences? I asked a grade 13 student from one of the prestigious schools in town in Honiara and he said, “Well climate change is obviously sea level rise and yeah that’s about it”.

Little did he know that understanding the consequences of climate is important to change his behavior and helps him adapt to what is already a global emergency.

By not being informed can have negative consequences. As students it is important to stay inform and seek out reliable sources of information to ensure that you have the knowledge and understanding needed to make informed decisions to participate effectively in important decision makings.

The current events, politics, and social issues require us to be more vigilant and seek out right information and literally students are no exception as this will help them better engage and inform of the happenings around them and to develop a deeper understanding of the world and form there own opinions and develop critical thinking and perspectives on important issues.

Overall, the importance of being well-informed cannot be overstated. It lays the foundation for a student's success, both academically and personally.