Earl Moxam, Gleaner Writer
Left: Sewing class in session at Stella Maris Foundation's Centre in Grants Pen, St. Andrew. Right: Babies at rest at Stella Maris Foundation's Centre in Grants Pen, St. Andrew. - photos by Norman Grindley /Deputy Chief Photographer
Residents of Grants Pen and adjoining communities will shortly have a new training opportunity in a range of construction skills. This comes courtesy of the Stella Maris Foundation, located on Grants Pen Road.
The new thrust represents a departure from the previous approach, which emphasised woodworking skills in a relatively small workshop at the centre. A much larger space is to be created to facilitate the more ambitious project.
"We have looked at our woodwork project and we realised that there are more opportunities for young people in general construction, so we are actually migrating from woodwork into general construction," Jean Lowrie-Chin, chairman of the Stella Maris Foundation, told the Sunday Gleaner.
Already, she said, there were 31 candidates enrolled for the Heart Trust/National Training Agency sanctioned programme.
The change in emphasis was recommended, she said, by respected members of the construction industry; among them, Michael Archer, president of the Master Builders Association and a director of the Stella Maris Foundation's board, and Michael Hemming. The aim, Mrs. Lowrie-Chin explained, was to prepare the trainees not just for the local job market, but for possible opportunities throughout Caricom.
This expanding horizon for the young people of Grants Pen is a far cry from the situation when the Stella Maris foundation was established a decade ago.
It came at a time of growing concern about deteriorating social conditions in Grants Pen, with murder being a regular feature of the problem.
Peter Mais, the first chairman of the foundation, recalls that it was during a meeting at the church, headed then by Monsignor Richard Albert, that he suggested the establishment of the new body (modelled off the St. Patrick's Foundation). That meeting, he said, had been called to canvass opinions on how to address the social conditions besetting the marginalised Grants Pen community.
It did not take long for the community to recognise and accept the foundation for the good it was doing. This was brought home forcefully to Mais during the gas riots of 1999, when the foundation's office was virtually the only facility left untouched by looters.
"This showed that the people of the community appreciated what we were doing, and from there on we gradually got into the peace process," he explained.
Today, Peter Mais, still grieving over the loss of his wife Vilma to a vicious murder on the Stella Maris church premises some months ago, remains as committed as ever to that peace process and the projects being pursued by the foundation.
Skills training
Those projects include training in a range of skills - information technology, sewing, papier mache, and construction, with cosmetology to be added soon. Life skills are also important components of all the training options offered.
Medical referrals and counseling are also provided, but in a carefully considered manner, according to board member, Dr. Annette Alexis.
"We prefer not to provide a fish (service) because I saw that we would be just as inundated as the Kingston Public Hospital and the University Hospital, so we did not become another service centre where we dealt with cuts and bruises," she said.
Instead, she explained, for the small percentage of the population that needed secondary health care, "We got on board a panel of mainly Roman Catholic (but others as well) doctors who are specialists in various areas that we refer to as necessary. They make their diagnoses, they give their advice on consultation and those are sent back to the public institutions."
The challenges identified in relation to the youth population were largely problems of psychology and social diseases, particularly HIV/ AIDS. To address those issues she said the foundation also embarked on a programme "to lessen the rift between the social classes."
Fr. Michael Lewis, pastor of Stella Maris Church, has taken seriously that challenge of healing the social rifts between the communities the church serves. One important approach to that task, he maintains, is through improved educational opportunities for those who are less privileged.
Homework centre
"Teenagers and other school goers are provided with a homework centre where they can come in and do their research and use our computers, and we help to prepare those who are getting ready to sit their CXC and CAPE exams. We provide tutors for them so that they can have a better chance."
For the adults, the emphasis is on skills training and adult education. And with the Government announcing a new high school equivalency programme for adult learners, the foundation is getting set to take advantage of that avenue of advancement for its adult participants as well.
The Stella Maris Foundation's Centre is located a stone's throw away from the new Grants Pen service centre at Amcham Place, complete with a police station, a health clinic and various commercial services.
The two centres are not rivals, Jean Lowrie-Chin emphasised, but complement each other in their efforts to bring about lasting change in what hitherto was one of the most marginalised communities in the Corporate Area.
