RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

Se­nior Mul­ti­me­dia Re­porter

rad­hi­ca.sookraj@guardian.co.tt

De­spite op­er­at­ing with a di­lap­i­dat­ed sci­ence lab, Fyz­abad An­gli­can Sec­ondary School has con­tin­ued to ex­cel in sci­ence, with stu­dents con­sis­tent­ly earn­ing full cer­tifi­cates, of­ten in sci­en­tif­ic fields.

It is this track record of aca­d­e­m­ic ex­cel­lence that prompt­ed a New York-based char­i­ta­ble or­gan­i­sa­tion to step in and help up­grade the school’s fa­cil­i­ties.

The Trinidad and To­ba­go Unit­ed Com­mu­ni­ty As­so­ci­a­tion Inc., based in Brook­lyn, pre­sent­ed a cheque to the south Trinidad school on Thurs­day to as­sist with re­fur­bish­ing its sci­ence lab.

Rep­re­sent­ing the or­gan­i­sa­tion was Alethea St Bernard Mar­shall, its past pres­i­dent and cur­rent vice pres­i­dent.

St Bernard Mar­shall said the school was se­lect­ed be­cause of its strong ed­u­ca­tion­al mis­sion and its record of nur­tur­ing stu­dents.

She added that the rec­om­men­da­tion al­so came from past pres­i­dent Beryl Hinds, a for­mer stu­dent of the school and a key mem­ber of the as­so­ci­a­tion, who sug­gest­ed Fyz­abad An­gli­can for this year’s an­nu­al char­i­ta­ble do­na­tion.

The com­mit­tee unan­i­mous­ly agreed.

“Sup­port­ing schools like Fyz­abad An­gli­can means in­vest­ing in the coun­try’s fu­ture sci­en­tists, doc­tors and pro­fes­sion­als,” Mar­shall said. “If we don’t pro­vide the fa­cil­i­ties for ex­per­i­ments and hands-on ex­pe­ri­ence, we are sell­ing them short. Even a small con­tri­bu­tion can make a sig­nif­i­cant dif­fer­ence when com­bined with con­tin­ued sup­port.”

Mar­shall ex­plained that the as­so­ci­a­tion, made up of Trinida­di­ans and To­bag­o­ni­ans liv­ing in the Unit­ed States, has been in ex­is­tence for more than six decades. It hosts an an­nu­al In­de­pen­dence Dance in New York as one of its ma­jor fundrais­ers and of­fers schol­ar­ships to stu­dents of Trinidad and To­ba­go her­itage pur­su­ing bach­e­lor’s de­grees.

Prin­ci­pal Keiza Fe­lix-Roberts de­scribed the do­na­tion as hum­bling and time­ly, com­ing as the school be­gins its 85th an­niver­sary cel­e­bra­tions.

She said the sci­ence labs have faced chal­lenges for more than a decade, in­clud­ing ter­mite-dam­aged desks and stools, as well as the high cost of chem­i­cals need­ed for ex­per­i­ments and school-based as­sess­ments.

The re­fur­bish­ment will di­rect­ly ben­e­fit rough­ly 300 of the school’s 577 stu­dents who use the lab fa­cil­i­ties, in­clud­ing 50 to 70 stu­dents at the Form Six lev­el.

Fe­lix-Roberts said the con­tri­bu­tion marks an “awe­some be­gin­ning” to­ward restor­ing the lab and en­sur­ing stu­dents have the prop­er fa­cil­i­ties to achieve their full sci­en­tif­ic po­ten­tial.