Garcia: Natl schols next week

TYRELL GITTENS

Education Minister Anthony Garcia yesterday said that the list of national scholarship winners including President’s Medal winner/s will be made public some time next week, provided Cabinet approves the list.

“I am hoping that sometime next week we’ll be able to release the names of students who will receive national scholarships, once we have approval from the Cabinet. So sometime next week,” Garcia said.

Asked if there will be less or more scholarships distributed, Garcia said that information was not yet available to him as the ministry’s scholarship section is still working on the list.

TT students distinguished themselves in this year’s Caribbean Secondary Education Certificate (CSEC) and Caribbean Advanced Proficiency Examination (CAPE) as they topped 47 subject areas.

In the CSEC examinations TT students topped eight subjects which included chemistry, biology, English A, information technology, music, visual arts, technical drawing and textiles, clothing and fashion.

In CAPE, local students topped 39 subjects which included Caribbean studies, communication studies, pure maths unit one, pure maths unit two, Spanish unit one and Spanish unit two. In CAPE applied maths unit one and environmental science unit two there was a clean sweep as TT students occupied the top ten in both subjects.

On TT’s performance in CXC Garcia said, “Our students continue to excel at every level of the education system, the examination results show that.” He added, “The results are a manifestation of the dedication and hard work put in by students and teachers.” Saying that managing the over 700 schools in the education system can sometimes be difficult, Garcia said the education ministry tries to deal with difficulties as quickly as they arrive.

He thanked teachers for assisting the ministry’s efforts as he said, “I must complement teachers on the hard work and dedication that they are showing in an effort to ensure that our students benefit from the quality education that we are determined to provide.” The Caribbean Examinations Council (CXC) will award top performers in a ceremony to be held on on Thursday 5 December 2019 in Grenada.

Lakshmi Girls’ Hindu College student Amanda Williams will be the inaugural winner in the newly created Professor Wilma Bailey Award for Outstanding Performance in CSEC Geography while Renée Blanc of St Joseph’s Convent will be awarded the Best 2-Dimensional Visual Arts Award and Faith Barnett of Bishop Anstey High School will receive the Best 3-Dimensional Visual Arts Award.

Guyanese student Riana Toney of the Anna Regina Secondary School, in Guyana, will receive the the CSEC top award from 2019. Riana won the Overall Outstanding Achievement award with grade ones in 19 subjects.