Digicel sponsors homework centre in La Horquetta

Children and families in La Horquetta will soon benefit from the opening of a homework centre at the La Horquetta Village Plaza.

The Digicel Foundation partnered with the Greenvale Park Police Youth Club, the Housing and Development Corporation and MP for the area Foster Cummings to provide a space for the La Horquetta community to access internet, computer and printing services. It was launched on Wednesday morning.

Cummings, who is also Minister of Youth Development and National Service, said, "I am very excited to welcome the Digicel Foundation to La Horquetta to establish this computer lab for the benefit of our young people. I want to thank the Ministry of Housing and Urban Development for partnering with the Digicel Foundation and the Police Youth Club to bring this facility to La Horquetta. The people of La Horquetta will certainly benefit from it."

The Digicel Foundation, which funded the programme, sponsored six desktop computers, furniture, desks and printers and will provide internet access for a year through the Digicel Plus programme.

Diana Mathura-Hobson from the Digicel Foundation said the La Horquetta project "is one of four centres in progress. It is called the Digicel Foundation Technology in Education Centre."

Centres in Penal and one in Tobago will be opened soon. The cost to the Digicel Foundation of the four projects was around US$28,000, she said. The La Horquetta centre cost US$5,300.

General manager of Digicel Plus Jason Matthews said, "I am hopeful that the youth will benefit from this initiative and see us as being a part of transforming their lives."

WPC Sorzano, leader of the Greenvale Park Police Youth Club, said the development team is still working out the logistics of opening hours.

Sorzano said, "It will be based on demand, but we would like it to run seven days a week. Since we're focusing on school-aged children, we don't want it to run too late into the night. Maybe 7 pm on average, for the latest."

The homework centre is just the start. Sorzano hoped other programmes would make use of the centre, like those geared toward computer literacy, and ALTA – the Adult Literacy Tutors Association.

She hoped financial management training would also be done there.

"That is something you don't find in schools. The homework centre focuses on schoolwork, so we want to engage the youth in other educational activities."

The Greenvale Park Police Youth Club provided stationery for Wednesday's launch, including copybooks, glue sticks, pencils, pens and sharpeners.