Livern Barrett, Staff Reporter

TEN STUDENTS attending Corporate Area schools are to receive financial assist-ance to offset some of the cost of their education. The sponsorship by the First Union Financial Group, through its Tyco Foods brand, will cover tuition fees and the cost of books.

Tyco Foods' managing director, Lloyd Campbell, said his company was trying to help students who have "shown an appetite for learning", despite financial difficulties.

"Whatever we can do to make a difference in these students' lives we try to do it," he told The Sunday Gleaner last week, after some of the students were taken on a tour of two of the companies in the First Union Group.

Campbell said the sponsorship will cover the first year of school, but may be extended, based on the students' academic performance.

Coordinator for the project, Jannette Clarke, explained that the students' report cards will be analysed at the end of each school term "to determine how well they are doing".

"Once they are on the programme, we don't want a straight line in terms of their performance," she said, adding that she expects to see steady growth over the academic year.

Well appreciated

Dionne Johnson, whose daughter Junell Douglas is one of those benefiting from the initiative, welcomed the gesture, saying it will make a difference for her. "It is very expensive these days to school children ... . Times are really hard so it will help me financially," she said.

Clarke said the sponsorship is part of an overall strategy to motivate young children to do well in school, adding that she was trying to get more companies to come on board to help more students.

"We are trying to steer youngsters from a life of idleness that could possibly turn them to a life of crime," the project co-ordinator told The Sunday Gleaner. "So we want to save youngsters, we want to bring them into the productive workforce," she added.

Clarke heaped praise on the First Union Financial Group for supporting this initiative. The group will also providing mentors for the students in the programme.

livern.barrett@gleanerjm.com

  CAPTIONS:

General manager of First Union Financial Group, Lessanne Roper-Bennett (left), greets (from left) Michael Walters of Jamaica College, Kadeem Brown of St George's College, and Junell Douglas of the Convent of Mercy (Alpha), before they are given a tour of the company's New Kingston offices recently. They are among 10 students the company is helping with their educational costs. - Photo by Winston Sill/Freelance Photographer

First Union's scholarship winners tour Mr Lee's Factory, Westminster Road, last Wednesday. - Photo by Winston Sill/Freelance Photographer