TUITION expenses will not be of concern for Chritine-Ameila Seville this school year.

The University of Technology (UTech), Jamaica student is among five awarded $500,000 scholarships from the JPS Foundation, to pursue engineering studies at the tertiary institution.

“This scholarship was so important because I needed the assistance in order to start off my academic journey,” shared Seville, an Ardenne High graduate who’s all set to read for a degree in industrial engineering at UTech.

The 19-year-old is thankful for the financial intervention from the philanthropic arm of the island’s leading energy company.

“My father is the sole provider for me and my brother who is about to start high school,” she revealed of the single-parent household on account of her mother’s transition six years earlier from pancreatic cancer. “As he now has more responsibilities for my sibling, the financial demands will be way more than before.”

Christopher Seville, the deaf family patriarch, works as a teacher’s aide at the Jamaica Association for the Deaf.

His daughter assessed that the Power Up East-West Power Scholarship for which Seville was shortlisted, “will make my academic journey so much easier without placing that pressure on him and allow me also to pursue what I want to”.

The student was speaking in an interview after the JPS Foundation Power Up Scholarship Awards ceremony wrapped at the Jamaica Pegasus hotel.

The late-morning honours presentation saw 28 scholarship recipients, a mix of university and high school beginners, gathered in the hotel’s ballroom to be feted and awarded scholarships or grants, to offset the heavy costs of tuition.

Launched in 2024, the programme this year, expended $11 million in scholarships and grants combined.

In addition to five UTech engineering students, one student from the College of Agriculture, Science and Education (CASE) received $500,000 for the Power Up Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) grant.

Meanwhile, 10 students were awarded $60,000 each for the Power Up Community Renewal Grant.

Under the Power Up STEM Tertiary Scholarship, three tertiary students received $400,000 and three teachers’ college students received $400,000.

Lastly, the JPS VOLTS PEP Scholarship provided three top Primary Exit Profile (PEP) students, one from each county, $60,000 individually. These latter scholarships resulted from direct contribution made by JPS employees in supporting new high school entrants.

The tertiary beneficiaries will be attending the UTech; CASE; The University of the West Indies, Mona; and a number of teacher’s colleges across the island.

All set to start her first year at the University of Technology, Jamaica, Chritine-Ameila Seville receives a kiss from her proud father Christopher Seville, a teacher’s aide at the Jamaica Association for the Deaf.

Seville, who learnt sign language at seven months, and today acts as an interpreter for her father when they are out, aspires to join the staff at the Norman Manley International Airport, once higher education is completed.

“I chose to study industrial engineering based on my internship at the airport last year. It opened my eyes to a lot of things that happen behind the scenes in ensuring the efficiency of processes and systems, and how people and machinery and the environment have to work together to ensure things run smoothly,” she explained of her two-month-long experience in the electromechanical and heating, ventilation, and air-conditioning department.

JPS President and Chief Executive Officer Hugh Grant celebrated the significance of what the recipients had achieved.

“You were selected from over 1,000 submissions the foundation received this year, so that alone is impressive,” he told the awardees. “Education is the differentiator that will take you where you want to go.”

Meanwhile, assistant chief education officer in the Ministry of Education Dr Tamika Benjamin hailed the JPS Foundation’s focus on STEM education.

Triumph over adversity in the West

Boosting her niece Ashley-Ann Spence’s confidence, Ishia Scott applauded in wild abandon as the tween made her way across the stage inside the Pegasus to receive a trophy.

“I am so proud of her,” beamed Scott, a merchandising supervisor who escorted Ashley-Ann from Westmoreland to Kingston for the scholarship awards.

“After Hurricane Melissa, her family lost their house and her school New Works Primary was completely destroyed. But Ashley persevered to achieve top marks in PEP and she got into Belmont Academy, the high school she always wanted to attend,” Scott disclosed.

“I’m so pleased that she’s here today based on the hard work that she put in using lamplight at nights to study.”

The 11-year-old’s name had been submitted by administrators at her primary school for the PEP scholarship on the strength of performance in the high school entrance exams.

For Ashley-Ann, “the scholarship means a lot to me and my parents. It will help with my school expenses and it takes some pressure off them,” she relayed of her farmer father Garfield Spence and housewife mother Ann Marie Williams. “I am very thankful to the JPS Foundation for believing in me and this has encouraged me to keep working harder in school.”

Delivering the keynote address, Winston Blackwood, JPS head of digital transformation and business effectiveness, underscored the importance of building personality traits, while scoring good grades.

“The real prize is the person you will become because someone believed in you,” Blackwood told the scholarship recipients.