Basseterre, St. Kitts, June 13, 2017 (SKNIS): The Ministry of Education has received a generous monetary donation from Delta Petroleum St. Kitts Ltd. to the tune of $16,250 to assist public schools, at all levels of education, with their graduations and thanksgiving services.
“We know that the quality of education today is very expensive,” said the Ministry’s Permanent Secretary, William Hodge. “So, to encourage schools to bring out the best in our students we would like to offer them as much incentives that we can. These funds today go towards exactly that project.”
Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Education, Honourable Shawn Richards, expressed his sincerest gratitude to the company for its monetary donation.
“We of course would like to say thanks to Delta Petroleum for celebrating with our students, for celebrating with our schools,” he said.
The amount of $250 will be given to each early childhood centre and $500 to each primary and secondary school.
“Graduation is the time of the year when our students are being recognized for completing at least the last year of school for their particular level and moving on to the next,” said the minister. “It is a time when teachers, parents, students, well-wishers and supporters all come together to celebrate with the students. As they celebrate this year, just as they celebrated last year, Delta Petroleum will indeed be contributing towards this celebration.”
Minister Richards said that he is certain that all of the persons would be happy for him to extend thanks on their own behalf to the company.
Parents who patronize Delta Petroleum would now recognize that the company is being a good corporate citizen as it is giving back to their children, said Minister Richards. He added that the ministry is partnering with the company to ensure that the graduation ceremonies are more meaningful and successful.
Robert Liburd, Island Manager for Delta Petroleum, said that it was an honour for the company to partner with the Ministry of Education to provide the monetary assistance.
“You would have heard the old adage that the children are our future,” he said, noting that the company believes in caring for the nation’s children. He added that Delta Petroleum is a community based company and wants to help children as they grow up to remember that it assisted them.
Regional Manager, Bevis Sylvester, said that a similar exercise was done in 2016.
“This is indicative of Delta’s commitment going forward of ensuring that this exercise that we would say is not much, but it’s $16,250 being injected to all schools including the high schools, primary schools and the early childhood programmes,” he said.
The regional manager noted that it is not enough to say that they will make a positive contribution to the youth, but to do it as well. “These are our future customers,” he said.
Mr. Sylvester encouraged other companies to come on board with them to assist in the education of the nation’s youth.
Delta Petroleum also made a commitment to donate money during five additional years totaling $106,250. The company has not only committed funding to the youth of St. Kitts, but also to those in Nevis.