Newly minted professor at The University of the West Indies (UWI), Senator Dr Floyd Morris is encouraging Jamaicans to use his story of challenges and triumph as an inspiration to achieve great success.

Morris issued the appeal during last Friday’s sitting of the Upper House after being invited by Senate President Tom Tavares-Finson to share his journey to achieving this tremendous feat.

“I say to every Jamaican, anything that you want to accomplish, you can accomplish because Floyd Morris, a blind boy from Bailey’s Vale in St Mary, can rise to the level of professor at the greatest university in the Caribbean. I say, they can too. And I want to encourage all Jamaicans, let us travel down that path and make sure that we do what is right to be successful,” he said ahead of being congratulated by his fellow senators.

Morris said it was a very special movement for him, given the historical significance of his elevation as this was the first in the 75-year history of The UWI that an individual with a visual disability has been promoted to the rank of professor. He added that this is also the first time someone with a visual disability in the Caribbean and Latin America has been promoted in terms of professorship in the area of disability studies.

“It took me back to 1986 when I graduated from high school without a single subject because of the challenges that I was having with glaucoma and then three years after, in 1989, that was the last time I saw this world,” he said.

Morris shared that though it has been a journey of challenges, he was strengthened by the resolve “that no matter what, I wasn’t going to make blindness hold me back” choosing instead to see his disability as a temporary halt to progress.

“And so, I made sure that I utilised what my God has given me, and that is a brain to think and to use that for my personal empowerment but also in the struggle for the betterment of others — my brothers and sisters with disabilities,” he said.

Noting that many people with a visual disability don’t usually move beyond the PhD level due to how challenging it is, he said his elevation is even more significant. He said 90 per cent of materials that are written in academia are printed, so he had the task of converting those into an accessible format that he could read and work with to do research and publications.

“It has been a tremendous journey and I am deeply grateful to The University of the West Indies for the confidence that they have reposed in me to allow me to practice my craft and my skills and they give me… support in terms of my work engagement. But I tell you, the half has not been told because what gives me even greater pride and joy was when I was told that external assessors were extremely glowing in their report on the body of work that I have done,” he said.

“We have the capacity and the power within us to do anything that we want to do,” he insisted. “I want to make an appeal to those who believe that they can scam their way to progress or prosperity that that is not what genuine Jamaicans are about. We are hard-working people who believe that when we put our shoulders to the wheel and utilise our God-given talent we can accomplish anything. Indeed, our great national hero, Marcus Garvey, said to us ‘Up ye mighty race, accomplish what you will’,” Morris said.

Government Senator Matthew Samuda, in praising Morris on his achievement, said, “Despite the political divide, we are proud of you and we are happy for your accomplishment and we know many more will come”.

“The will and fortitude, strength, and indeed ambition of the man is purely outlined in that story,” he said while acknowledging the role his colleague’s mother played in building his sense of resilience.

Also congratulating his colleague, Opposition Senator Peter Bunting said he hopes young people, particularly those with challenges, will be inspired by Morris’s story.

Tavares-Finson said he is proud of Professor Morris and believes his life “is such an inspiration to so many Jamaicans”.

“Deepest and most sincere congratulations from myself, members of the Senate, and I speak for the members of the staff, the clerk, and her team as well, in congratulating you,” Tavares-Finson said.

This is not the first time Morris has created history, having become the first blind member of the Senate when he was appointed in 1998. He served in the Senate until 2007 when the then governing People’s National Party (PNP) lost the 2007 General Election.

From 2001 to 2007, he served as the minister of state in the Ministry of Labour and Social Security. He regained his Senate seat in 2012, following the 2011 General Election, which saw the PNP regaining power.

He became the 12th president of the Senate in May 2013.

In November 2020, Morris was elected to the United Nations Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities which monitors implementation of the rules of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) in the more than 180 countries that have signed and ratified the treaty. Morris is the first person in the Caribbean to have been elected to this committee.

Between 2002 and 2006, he led the negotiations for Jamaica at the CRPD, and eventually signed and ratified the convention for Jamaica in 2007.

Morris was also the chairman for the Jamaica Society for the Blind from 2000 to 2001 and was the host of a two-hour weekly radio programme Seeing from a Different Perspective, which focused on disability and societal issues.

He has written an autobiography entitled By Faith, Not By Sight – The Autobiography of Jamaica’s First Blind Senator. In 2020, he published his second book Political Communication Strategies in Post-Independence Jamaica 1972-2006, and in 2022 he released Cultural Inclusion: The Case of Persons with Disabilities in Jamaica.

Morris, who has also published research on people with disabilities, holds a Bachelor of Arts in Mass Communication from The UWI, a Master of Philosophy in Government, and a doctorate in the same field.