MONTEGO BAY, St James — An overwhelming wave of requests for assistance from students and schools across western Jamaica has driven this year’s Jill Stewart MoBay City Run payout well beyond its $10-million target to more than $17 million.

“Ten million dollars became $17 million, not because we changed the target, but because the need changed us,” founder and chair of the charity event, Janet Silvera, told last Friday’s scholarship presentation at S Hotel in Montego Bay.

The expanded programme is expected to benefit more than 6,000 students, including some attending secondary school, as well as institutions recovering from Hurricane Melissa which ravaged the western parishes last October.

The assistance is also being used to strengthen schools. Herbert Morrison Technical High is receiving support to rebuild its farm, Cornwall College is getting help to rehabilitate its industrial arts programme, while Maggotty High received $2.5 million — the largest single institutional allocation this year.

Mount Alvernia High School is receiving assistance to repair its hurricane-damaged dance floor, while a Manchester school plagued by robberies is getting funding for security cameras.

Silvera said the record number of applications highlighted the financial pressures facing families and schools. She cited the case of a Hopewell applicant who works as a chef to finance his education while pursuing his ambition of becoming a bassist and music educator, and another student at Sam Sharpe Teachers’ College who was unable to sit an examination because of an outstanding tuition balance.

The latter case, Silvera said, was particularly poignant because Jill Stewart, the late wife of Sandals Resorts International Executive Chairman Adam Stewart, was an educator.

Silvera thanked the nearly 10,000 participants and sponsors who supported the 10th staging of the run, as well as the St James Municipal Corporation and other agencies that helped prepare Montego Bay for the event.

She said the run’s mission goes beyond scholarships to strengthening western Jamaica’s educational institutions and helping to stem the region’s brain drain.

“So every single company in this room should support this run because we ensure that the students attend school here so they can go out and work in your companies,” Silvera said.

Keynote speaker, Jamaica Teachers’ Association (JTA) President La Sonja Harrison welcomed the increased investment but stressed that education requires sustained funding.

“Seventeen million dollars and counting for education — over 6,000 students to benefit, this is what I live for. Yes, because Jamaican education is in need of funding,” she said.

Harrison urged principals to invest in character development, values, attitudes and ethical empowerment, stressing that modern school buildings will count for little if the people within them lack the principles and integrity needed to build a sustainable society.

Montego Bay Deputy Mayor Councillor Dwight “Debo” Crawford (left) and Sandals Resorts Regional Managing Director Jeremy Jones in dialogue at the Jill Stewart MoBay City Run scholarship presentation at S Hotel in Montego Bay last Friday.

“Our physical buildings will become hollow places of dissension, divisive in nature, if the people who occupy same lack moral character and fortitude needed for true building of a sustainable nation,” said the JTA president.

Sandals Resorts Regional Managing Director Jeremy Jones said Jill Stewart would have been proud of the initiative, given her lifelong commitment to education and running.

Jones noted that Stewart was an educator by training, a founding member of Fairfield Academy, and an avid runner who competed in the London Marathon, participated in the Disney Dopey Challenge and the MoBay City Run.

He said the combination of running and raising funds for education reflect two of her greatest passions.

On behalf of the Stewart family and Sandals, Jones thanked the organisers and participants while reaffirming the company’s commitment to Montego Bay, where Sandals was founded.

Montego Bay Deputy Mayor Councillor Dwight “Debo” Crawford described the run as a cherished part of the resort city’s calendar, and praised its role in bringing the community together to support education.

He urged scholarship recipients to regard the assistance as a launch pad rather than a finishing line, challenging them to become future entrepreneurs, educators, health-care professionals, tourism leaders, creatives, and public servants.

Belmont Academy Principal Rayon Simpson acknowledged that the expanded programme has provided much-needed reassurance to schools devastated by Hurricane Melissa.

Belmont was among the schools severely affected, and Simpson said the assistance made the institution and its students feel that they were not alone during a difficult period.

He thanked Silvera and the organising committee on behalf of the beneficiaries, saying their intervention brought comfort to schools that had felt isolated in the aftermath of the hurricane.

“We felt that we were by ourselves on many days and on many occasions, and people like Janet and the organising committee of this noble movement made us feel that we were not alone,” Simpson said.

Silvera said the record allocation represents an investment not only in individual students but in the future of western Jamaica.

“Today is more than a scholarship; we’re investing in people, in possibilities, and in the future of the west,” she said.