There were Just eight graduates at the simple but moving Graduation Ceremony of The St Jude's School For Girls' Class of 2002 - Culinary Arts/Life Skills Development Course.
Last Saturday morning Nerissa Sookoo, Tanisha Mc Ewin, Crystal Quammie, Kim Smith, Crystal Alfred, Candace Rennie, Natasha Watson and Melinda Bernard were proudly presented by their tutors, Leyanne Phipps-Choy and Laura George, in their beautiful gowns. At the start of the course, sponsored by the Rotary Club of Maraval, a little over a year ago, some of these 15-17 year olds were unable to boil water or light an oven. Says George, in the class review "we (the two tutors) were enthusiastic to say the least. As we planned sessions for the girls we realised just how uncharted our path was."
The tutors started with breakfast dishes as they tried also to impress upon the girls the importance of learning and understanding the business parts of Culinary Arts, introducing them to book-keeping followed by small scale entrepreneurship. "The girls could be seen on the compound encouraging Sister and workers to buy their goodies, sometimes even walking with a sample or two" said George. "Cooking was becoming a part of their lives. This was evident when they started asking to practise things they thought were giving them trouble to understand."
The class picked up such momentum that four girls were given the chance by Sister Joan Charlerie, principal of St Jude's, to pursue a course in bread, cakes and pastry at The School of Continuing Studies at the University of the West Indies. They did exceptionally well. In the weekly exams given over the ten week course, the St Jude's girls names would be called as having gotten 90-98% in their work. Their final internal exam in June, included meal planning, table setting, cooking a three course meal and serving it.
Having now replaced an absence of responsibility towards work with confidence and a sense of commitment to individual responsibility, the graduates commenced on-the-job training on the Monday immediately after graduation, at the Trinidad Hilton, Sweet Lime and Solimar. And says Phipps-Choy "because of this job training programme that we have developed, these girls who have been displaced by society, instead of having nowhere to go and nothing to do, now definitely have a future. It was hard because when we first started I thought I was just going there to teach Culinary Arts, but it turned out to be a lot of psychological tutoring as well."
Minister Donna Carter, who handed out the certificates, spoke of her government's emphasis on human resource development "we are putting young people first. A whole series of programmes is being developed for young people along with the necessary stipend so that they would learn to say no to ten days. It must eventually go, it does not enhance anybody's personality and is just a stop gap programme. "
Hence the reason a work plus skills training so you do not just take ten days away without offering other things, of which to-day's graduation is the perfect example. To the eight graduates, she advised "you are getting the opportunity, grab it, make the best of it and run with it."