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Westmoreland Custos tells young people to create their own jobs

Published:Monday | June 29, 2015 | 2:18 PM
Christopher Thomas
From left: Dr Horace Chang, member of parliament for North West St James; Glendon Harris, mayor of Montego Bay; Fagan Calvert, chairman of the Montego Bay Community College's (MBCC) board of management; and the Reverend Hartley Perrin, custos rotulorum for Westmoreland, stand at the head table during the MBCC's 40th anniversary valedictory service on Sunday, at which Rev Perrin delivered the keynote address.

WESTERN BUREAU:

The Reverend Hartley Perrin, the custos rotulorum of Westmore-land, wants young people in Jamaica to invest their talents and training in the creation of jobs locally rather than seek to migrate overseas in search of better employment opportunities.

Giving the keynote address at the Montego Bay Community College's (MBCC) 40th anniversary valedictory service on Sunday, the custos said that young people in Jamaica need to be more innovative and willing to persevere in creating their own employment despite the sense of frustration many youth feel when they are unable to find jobs upon completing their education.

"There is a tendency for young people who go looking for a job when there is one vacancy and 600 people are looking to fill that one vacancy, there is the danger of feeling a sense of hopelessness," said Perrin. "Unless and until we have learned to create our own jobs, we will feel that sense of disappointment.

"When the challenges come, especially with respect to not getting employed, do not allow the lure of overseas travel to take you away from Jamaica," Perrin said.

"As long as we continue to move away from our country without recognising the need to build our country to the point where we will get the benefits we deserve, we are going to be forever in danger and hardships."

Perrin also advised the graduates to set realistic goals and to be innovative in their approach to job creation.

"Do not just be drifting. Set yourselves attainable goals ... . The only person who can have a dream come true is the person who has been dreaming," he said. "The same exciting world in which we live is the same world that says to us that we have to be innovative."

One hundred and eighty students participated in this year's valedictory service at the MBCC, which was held under the theme 'Celebrating the Past, Impacting the Present, Transforming the Future'.

Among the graduates who received special recognition for outstanding achievements were Deidre-Ann Brown, who delivered the valedictory address and received an academic award for her performance in the pre-university sciences; and Khadijah James, who received the Rotaract Award for outstanding service to the college and who was also voted Student of the Year, along with fellow graduate Dextavia Sinclair.

- Christopher Thomas