Novelette Prince: Embracing the value of education

SHE recalls being constantly encouraged by her mother and grandmother to get a good education as it would provide her with options and economic independence.

With this advice having served her well, wherever she goes, and with whomever she interacts, she makes sure to pass on the same message, and her listeners leave feeling empowered to raise their personal standard of excellence.

Meet Novelette Prince, an educator born in May Pen, Clarendon, who spent most of her formative years enjoying “true country life” with relatives from Banana Ground and Ritchies in upper Clarendon.

Prince told All Woman that those years were fun and taught her responsibility, but she had hopes of being a flight attendant or a medical technologist — choices which did not sit well with her mother.

“She said, ‘No, you’re going to be a teacher. That’s what I wanted to do and never got the chance to do it.’ So I rebelled and wasted my first year at Moneague Teachers’ College,” she admitted.

However, Prince said after the first year of teaching practice she fell in love with the profession and saw where she could make a difference in young people’s lives.

After graduating from Moneague and heading to Kingston in 1986 for her first teaching job, which lasted for nine years — as a teacher of geography and integrated science at Kingston College – the true reality of the world became evident, making her understand her mother’s words.

“I didn’t know we were poor until I came to Kingston after teachers’ college at around 19, 20 years old. Back home, I thought we were the ‘big thing’ in the community as people would come to us for food and we always had produce to eat. But then I realised it was not so. My mother worked in the citrus factory at May Pen on the line packing fruits, and she would wash for people on the side. I quickly realised that because she wasn’t formally educated she had high hopes for us.

“Now the words of my grandmother and mother stuck out in my mind and pushed me to work,” Prince said. And so, throughout that time she kept on top of her game. She pursued a Bachelor of Arts degree in history with minors in marketing and accounting, as well as a Master of Science degree in public sector management at The University of the West Indies. She then moved on to do postgraduate studies in project management from the University of New Orleans and an advanced certificate in technical vocational education training and educational administration.

From her experience at KC, Prince said her focus on traditional academia began to shift, and in 1995 she left and joined the then HEART School of Cosmetology as a senior instructor.

“I liked what HEART was doing and continues to do – to reach out to those persons who are into technical areas. So I decided to go. It was the same education, but it was treating with a different target and I learnt to appreciate people for their technical know-how and realised that academics was not the end-all and be-all to success,” she explained.

During her tenure there, she quickly became a counsellor, placement officer and moved to being the deputy manager at Ebony Park HEART Academy before coming back to the School of Cosmetology as a manager.

With her passion for education at all levels recognised by her bosses, Prince was seconded to the Ministry of Education as the national coordinator for the ASTEP (Alternative Secondary Transition Education Programme) launched in September 2011 as a remedial programme for students who completed their years at the primary level of the education system without achieving mastery of the Grade Four Literacy Test.

After that tour of duty, she came back to what is now known as the HEART College of Beauty Services in the role of director. Now in her 22nd year at HEART, Prince prides herself on bringing Salon 10 and the College of Beauty Services to an institution of modernised business thinking. She has raised three children — a lawyer, a doctor, and a professional with the police inspectorate, and she dotes on her grandson Kaleb.

She also enjoys football, track and field, music, gardening, agriculture — growing rosemary, thyme, oregano, enjoying the spoils of her East Indian mango and apple trees, which she boasts of planting from scratch without fertilisers. She also helps the less fortunate through the Stella Maris Roman Catholic Church.

Prince said her focus is to continue contributing to the educational development of Jamaicans and encouraging humility.

“I love what I do and I am still in the classroom, as I also teach at the University College of the Caribbean. Irrespective of how high you go in life, always be humble.”

She urges women, “Don’t ever operate or feel like a fool because someone is more lettered than you. Embrace your negative experiences, use them to positively impact your growth.”