IRWIN, St James

THE Mavis Allen Basic School in Irwin, St James, which has been plagued with a lack of water for several years, last week finally said farewell to their water woes, after receiving a donation of a 650-gallon water tank from telecommunications provider, Digicel.

The school had been nominated in Digicel’s social media-driven #TankMySchool initiative by Kareen Binns, a teacher of the sciences at the nearby Irwin High School.

“The school was really in need of a water tank and Digicel’s initiative presented the perfect opportunity,” shared Binns. “It was such a coincidence that the same day I sent in the nomination, the Irwin High School Science Club had been painting the basic school and the principal and I were talking about the school’s needs. She had been telling me about the school’s needs so when I went home and saw Digicel’s promo on Facebook, I just sent in the nomination immediately, and now I’m delighted to see that they were actually selected.”

She continued, “The school is small but it has a lot of potential. Seeing Digicel do this has even motivated us as a club to do even more with them so that we can help them improve and become all they can be.”

According to Principal Audrea Drummond, the school has been forced to close at least three to four days each week for the past few months, due to water shortages.

“These shortages have really had a terrible impact on regular school operations as we didn’t have anything to store adequate water. So every time there is a water shortage, we have to close school and this doesn’t augur well for both the pupils and their parents.”

Added Drummond: “As a school, we have been trying to raise money to purchase a tank but we weren’t able to raise enough. So we started brainstorming other fundraising ideas to supplement that before we found out about Digicel’s Tank My School project. Now, after receiving the tank from Digicel, we used a portion of the money we had raised to install the plumbing and we’ll be able to use the rest to improve other things around the school, so we’re very grateful and happy to receive this donation.”