Digicel to provide UG scholarship to most outstanding athlete

The 61st National Schools Cycling, Swimming and Track and Field Championship, held in collaboration with the Ministry of Education (MOE) and the Guyana Teachers Union (GTU), was launched with pomp and splendour yesterday at the National Track and Field Centre at Leonora, West Coast Demerara.
Widely referred to as ‘Nationals’ the Event, under the theme ‘where Champions are born’, will see the participation of 15 Districts and over 1,600 students and Teachers and will begin in earnest on November 26.

The four-day Championships will conclude on December 1 when the closing ceremony will be held at Leonora.
Apart from speeches by officials from the organizers, there was a cultural presentation from female students from the West Demerara Secondary School, a display from the Region Three Marching Band, musical interlude from the West Demerara Secondary School’s Steelband, which played the National Anthem to open proceedings while a Universal was said by Caroline Daniel.

National Junior Athletes, 16-year-old ‘Nationals’ 800m record holder Narissa McPherson, and 18-year-old Odida Patterson, who won three Gold Medals in last year’s ‘Nationals’, winning the Boy’s 1,500m U-20, 5000m Male Open and 10k open, who both hail from the West Demerara, told the fair-sized gathering of their story of pain and glory during their short career and both will be running in this year’s event.

MOE’s deputy CEO-Technical, Dr Retish Tularam, speaking on behalf of Minister of Education Priya Manickchand, provided a background to the National Schools Championships.
“The National Schools Championships and competitions leading up to it represents the single largest sporting movement in Guyana.
The Inter-House, Inter-school and inter-zone competitions touch every Primary and Secondary and are essentially a combination of competitions used to select the best talents in swimming. Cycling and Athletics for each district in the country,” said Tularam.

“The Ministry of Education and the GTU cannot do this alone, and corporate Guyana must get involved and we are pleased to have some of our sponsors here today.
It is a wonderful gesture that Digicel will provide a University of Guyana scholarship to the most outstanding Athlete of there Championships,” posited Tularam who added that each district is allowed to register a team of up to 110 students and teachers.

Tularam thanked all those who assisted in Organising this Championships and extended best wishes to the teams added ‘may the best team win’ while saying ‘we are all winners.
Also speaking at yesterday’s launching was Vice-Chairman of Region 3, Omesh Satyanad, who thanked the Region Three Organising Committee and the business community for their support. He also promised that this year’s Championship will be bigger than last year.

Second Vice President of the GTU Julian Cambridge also made remarks while Gabriella Chapman (Digicel) and Shanisa Fredericks (Banks DIH) also gave brief remarks on behalf of the sponsors at the launching which was chaired by Marti DeSouza