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Rusea's principal says education ministry discriminating against rural schools
BY HORACE HINES, Observer West reporter
Thursday, June 11, 2009
COUSINS COVE, Hanover
June Thompson, principal of Rusea's High School, is accusing the ministry of education of dishing out preferential treatment to corporate area schools.
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| Oramay Carter (centre), widow of the late Byron Carter, is flanked by four awardees, from (left to right) Oshane Williams, Kerroy Ambersley, Awitha Beckford and Nathala Garrison. |
"I can speak strongly about that because I left Hanover and went to St Catherine to an upgraded high school - not a traditional high school like Rusea's High - and I can tell you the amount of amenities and facilities that are at that high school. Why? Because it is in the parish of St Catherine. Kingston and St Catherine that are benefitting immensely from whatever the ministry has," said Thompson, at last week's launch of the Byron Benjamin Educational Fund at the Cove Primary School in Hanover.
Added Thompson: "... when I call Region Four and I say I am going to want X at Rusea's, they think that I am in a dream world, I am fantasising because that's not possible. When we request it for Bog Walk High in St Catherine, the next day the truck is rolling in."
The fund was set up in honour of the late Benjamin Carter, a former JLP caretaker for the Cauldwell Parish Council Division in Hanover who died tragically over a year ago.
Last week it benefitted four grade seven high school students, Awitha Beckford of Mannings High; Oshane Williams and Nathala Garrison, both of Rusea's High School; and Kerroy Ambersley of Green Island High. They were awarded scholarships valued at over $600,000 for five years by the Byron Carter Educational Fund.
According to Carter's widow, Oramay, her late husband, who was born in Cacoon, attended the Cacoon All Age and lived in Cousins Cove, dreamt of providing educational opportunities for the needy children in the Cauldwell Parish Council Division. She explained that in order to be qualified for the scholarship which is publicly funded, students from the division must hail from a humble background, have to maintain an average 70 per cent and attend church.
Thompson, who was invited to deliver remarks, also encouraged the students to work for the upliftment of the parish.
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