Sherlette Black still has hopes of becoming a teacher
DESPITE her age and physical disability, Sherlette Black still has hopes of becoming a teacher.
Black, 41, who is visually impaired, said she has a passion for teaching children, but confronted several roadblocks in her journey to entering her profession of choice, including not passing the requisite subjects.
But she’s not giving up.
When Career & Education caught up with her at the Jamaica Society for the Blind in Kingston recently, she was studying for the subjects she would be sitting in this year’s Caribbean Secondary Examination Certificate exams.
She said she has already passed English language and principles of business, and this year is doing human and social biology, office administration and social studies.
“[Even with] my disability, I am not going to give up. I am going to continue trying. I think I may even [end up being] a guidance counsellor or a probation officer,” she said.
Over the years, Black, who is divorced, has been trying every means possible to provide for her two children — 13 and 18 years old.
“I have always been trying to survive. Up to 2002, I had a grocery shop at my previous house. The business there was booming, but due to some unfortunate circumstances, I had to leave,” she said.
In addition to losing that income, Black said she is one of several disabled Jamaicans who were displaced when the Jamaica Urban Transit Company (JUTC) placed a ban on preaching in buses.
On an average weekday, Black and her unemployed colleagues for the Jamaica Society from the Blind would meet, board the buses and host devotions or praise and worship sessions, then ask for contributions before taking their praise and worship sessions to the streets of Kingston.
It was one of their only sources of income, as for years they have faced employment challenges because of their disabilities.
Now, with a ban instituted by JUTC management, Black says she and her colleagues have lost a major portion of their weekly earnings.
“I am not surviving too well, because I used to sing on the buses and now I cannot anymore. On the buses I used to make money as a freelance musician, now it is not going too well,” she said.
“I have been searching for jobs. I have walked to many places but there are no jobs,” she added. “And we can’t just sit down because we have expenses also.”
Black said this new journey she is on will hopefully allow her to have a prosperous career.