The students of Presentation College, San Fernando, walked into the Lord Kitchener Auditorium of the National Academy for the Performing Arts on Tuesday as the top three winners of the National Secondary School Entrepreneurship Competition (NSSEC) were about to be announced.
Being stuck in close to four hours of traffic from San Fernando to Port-of-Spain had caused them to miss the majority of the closing ceremony including the announcement of the winners of each division.
“When we walked into the auditorium and we heard that Ark Presentation, Chaguanas, placed third we said we are sure we did not win anything,” Alexander Ramlogan from Presentation San Fernando’s Vision Computing Limited team said.
The reason for Ramlogan’s feeling was because Presentation, Chaguanas’ Ark team had been leading the entire competition up to yesterday.
Ark was also competing in the same division as Vision Computing Limited.
“They were beating us right through,” Steven Thomas said.
“They were dominating us straight through but Alex kept us working on it and we decided even though we are not topping the list we would still play like we are winning the game and we are not giving up,” Stephen Ali said.
That persistence paid off.
A final week surge by Vision Computing Limited helped the team leapfrog Ark and all other competitors and claim the NSSEC title for this year.
It was a reverse of the fortunes of the Presentation, San Fernando football team, who had been leading the Secondary School’s Football League for the entire tournament before losing out in the final game.
Ramlogan the team’s Chief Executive Officer (CEO) was yesterday lauded by his teammates for rallying the troops even when all the odds seemed against them.
“It was a lesson in patience and not giving up no matter how discouraging things might be,” Christian Brooker said.
Ramlogan said he was motivated by the longtime rivalry between Presentation, Chaguanas and Presentation, San Fernando.
“This is competition was worth it, everything we did in school this competition basically brought it to reality, it gave us a really good insight into the real world,” Kai Murphy said.
The Vision Computing Limited team from Presentation College, San Fernando, was 12th before the final results were announced yesterday.
They ended the competition with 642.64 points.
They screamed when their name was revealed at winners
WizTech Corporation from Corpus Christi placed second with 625.42 points.
The Form Four girls from Corpus Christi repeated the success of their predecessors who also placed second last year.
Ark from Presentation College, Chaguanas placed third with 601.90 points.
Sadly, problems with the seabridge yesterday caused 50 students from the schools in Tobago participating in the NSSEC to miss out on the closing ceremony.