Families celebrate
Anna-Lisa Paul
Published:
Friday, October 14, 2016
Priya Maraj of Lakshmi Girls’ Hindu College and Raquel Le Blanc of St Joseph’s Convent, Port-of-Spain, are this year's President’s Medal winners.
Minutes after the announcement was made by Education Minister Anthony Garcia yesterday, both girls said they were “blessed and honoured.”
Praising God, their teachers and family members, in that order, for their outstanding success, both Maraj and Le Blanc agreed that “it had not yet sunk in.”
Maraj said it was a “surreal feeling” while Le Blanc said: “I am a little shocked and overwhelmed but ever so grateful.”
Maraj, who is already enrolled at the University of the West Indies, St Augustine Campus, pursuing a double major in chemistry and bio-chemistry, said she was hoping to pursue a career in forensics.
The elder daughter of Geeta and Puran Maraj, the 18-year-old’s family said they were not surprised she won a scholarship as she had placed in the top 100 students when she wrote the Secondary Entrance Assessment (SEA) exam.
Aunt Asha Harripaul said she was pleasantly surprised to learn she had copped the President’s Medal, but added: “This is a child who came from a humble background but she did not let this deter her. She is a very simple child.”
Proud of her very hardworking niece, Harripaul said Maraj had maintained her excellent academic record from SEA through secondary school as she achieved eight distinctions at the Caribbean Examination Council (CXC) Ordinary Level exams and topped the Caribbean in Unit One in the areas of physics and chemistry.
Harripaul said: “We expected a scholarship but were uncertain if she would win the President's Medal.”
Maraj’s younger sister, Vishti, is a Form Five student at Lakshmi Girls’, so her family is already joking that she has some very large shoes to fill.
Principal of Lakshmi Girls Hindu College, Sonia Mahase-Persad, excitedly congratulated Maraj on her success as she said it was second consecutive win for the school in thar category. Shivrani Prabhudial was a President's Medal winner in 2015.
Mahase-Persad said: “We knew she could do this as her performance right through indicated this. Priya is a well-rounded student.”
Over at the Le Blanc house in Long Circular, it was a similar scene of jubilation as friends and family gathered to congratulate the excited young woman.
Honoured and overwhelmed by the level of her success, Le Blanc, 18, said she intended to continue pursuing law at the University of the West Indies, S. Augustine. Revealing her secret of prayer and hard work, Le Blanc’s parents said the support from teachers and family was also citrical.
Proud parents, Mera and Andre Le Blanc, said they worked hard to ensure Raquel and sister Justine had a comfortable environment in which to study. It was almost a mirror image of the Maraj household, in that Le Blanc’s sister is a Form Three student attending her sister’s alma-mater.
Excited, happy and thankful about her achievements, Le Blanc said the family was experiencing a range of emotions which had left them feeling breathless but happy.
SAGHS, Lakshmi, Naps shine
Garcia and Minister in the Ministry of Education, Dr Lovell Francis, were present at the hastily arranged press conference at the Ministry of Education, Port-of-Spain.
Vowing to cap off the scholarship ceiling at 400, Garcia said Cabinet had decided to award a total of 389 scholarships to students who excelled at the 2016 Caribbean Advanced Proficiency Examination (CAPE) exams.
He explained that seven spaces had been left available for students who may seek to query marks later on and who may be granted upgraded scores. Noting that the overall student performance this year was “generally good,” Garcia said it was in keeping with past results.
Providing a breakdown of the result in the Unit One module, Garcia said 94.6 per cent of students had been successful in achieving Grades 1 through 5. Of the 33 subject areas in this unit, students achieved a 90 per cent pass rate in 24 subject areas.
Noting students were continuing to perform very well, Garcia said in the Unit Two module, 94.1 per cent of students successfully achieved the requisite pass marks, which represented a slight increase from the previous year of 93.9 per cent.
With 91 open scholarships and 298 additional scholarships being awarded, Garcia said it would cost Government approximately $61,600,000 in total.
Acknowledging that girls continued to outperform boys at all levels, he said 247 scholarships were awarded to females compared to 142 being awarded to males.
He said that development continued to engage the policymakers, as systems were now being devised to increase and improve academic performance in Government schools, especially in light of the continued success being enjoyed by denominational primary and secondary schools.
The award of scholarships in various areas were: Business Studies (three open, 42 additional); Creative Studies (two open, two additional); Environmental (four open, 49 additional); General Studies (four open, two additional); Humanities (two open, one additional); ICT (50 open, three additional); Languages (11 open, five additional); Maths (34 open, 29 additional); Natural Sciences (16 open, 164 additional); and Technical Studies (one additional).
Admitting the results confirmed most students in the area of sciences, Garcia said Cabinet was concerned at that continuing development, as more efforts needed to be made to steer students in other subject areas, especially in keeping in line with the country's developmental agenda. He said the criteria used to select this year's winners did not vary from the process used last year.
He said he was proud students from five Government schools managed to secure a total of 17 scholarships.
Among the government schools that managed to secure scholarships was Queen's Royal College (six); Couva East Secondary School (six); St George's College (three); St. Francois Girls’ College (one) and Manzanilla Secondary (one).
Asked to say if the ministry had begun recouping monies from past scholarship winners, Lovell Francis replied: “Millions.” Leading the charge in copping the most of scholarships for 2016 were:
St Augustine Girls’ High School (45); Lakshmi Girls’ Hindu College (42); Naparima Boys’ (41); Naparima Girls’ (37); St. Joseph's Convent, PoS (29); Hillview College (28) and Presentation College, Chaguanas (25).
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President’s Medal winner Raquel Le Blanc, of St Joseph’s Convent, Port-of-Spain, is lifted by her father Andre, mother Mera and sister Justine at their home in The Meadows, Debe, Long Circular, after receiving her results yesterday. PHOTO: ABRAHAM DIAZ