By Suelika N. Buchanan
Editor-SKNVibes.com
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| (L-R) Wife of Michael Morton, Junie Morton; daughter of Warren Tyson, Pamela Tyson; Chairman of TDC Michael Morton and Minister of Education Sam Condor. |
(Basseterre; St. Kitts) It was 1981 when the Warren Cecil Tyson (WCT) Memorial Scholarship Programme was started.
The program was designed to assist and support students entering Public Secondary Schools across St. Kitts and Nevis began with three students.
The young scholars are eligible to receive financial assistance throughout their Secondary and Tertiary School tenures.
Now 25 years later TDC, the company that started the program is now celebrating the milestone and unveiled a plaque during a press conference yesterday, Thursday August 11, which featured the names of the students who have gone through the programme.
Present at the Unveiling Ceremony was the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Education, Sam Condor.
TDC officials including D. Michael Morton, chairman of TDC Ltd. Nicolas Menon, a director at TDC and chairperson of the Memorial Scholarship Committee.
Dennis Knight, programme co-ordinator, past and present TDC scholarship students and daughter of the late Warren Tyson, Pamela Tyson.
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| Past WCT Memorial Scholarship students at the unveiling ceremony. |
Menon delivered brief remarks saying that the program is used to assist students with school books, uniforms, and assist in school field trips which are sometimes organized by the French, Geography, History and Spanish classes of the schools.
"We also have a very hands on mentoring program that is apart of the scholarship programme that allows past students and some managers of TDC to act as Mentors for the scholars," he said.
Minister Condor applauded TDC for being the first company to start such an initiative because education is important.
Condor spoke warm heartedly about his own experience growing up as a young boy with his mother who could not afford to send him to secondary school.
"When it was time for me to go to secondary school, my mother couldn't afford it so she wanted me to drop up because my older sister was attending school," he said. "And I told her "no" because I wanted to get my education and I looked a summer job where I was a paper boy."
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| Present WCT Memorial Scholarship students at the unveiling ceremony. |
He said that he knows what the scholarship programme means to a number of boys and girls because he was unable to write his secondary exams.
In closing he thanked TDC for spearheading the initiative of the scholarship program in the community. That now has other businesses such as Cable & Wireless and Social Security who now offer scholarships.
Chairman of the Board of Directors at TDC Michael Morton said that Warren Tyson came from humble beginnings.
He also said that he would like to encourage all the students to be successful and ensure that they help carry on and build the legacy. He described them as being a special group and that TDC is committed to ensure their success right through life.
He also thanked shareholders and told them to continue contributing to TDC and said, "We will put it back into the Community."
After the unveiling of the plaque, the vote of thanks was done by Dennis Amory one of the first scholarship students.
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| (L-R) Dennis Amory, first WCT Memorial Scholarship Student, Nicolas Menon chairperson of WCT Memorial Scholarship Committee, Pamela Tyson, daughter of Warren Tyson and Chairman of TDC Michael Morton. |
In his speech Amory thanked TDC, the mentors who would keep close contact with the scholars and the teachers for recommending the students.
Students undergoing the scholarship programme are afforded the opportunity to work during their vacations and on Saturdays which helps them to develop socially and professionally.
Each year, the company injects approximately $1000,000 into the Programme, which amounts to an investment of about 2.5 million dollars, since its beginning in 1981.
