Alpha Phi Alpha donates US$50,000 to hurricane-impacted schools in Jamaica

Three Jamaican rural high schools that suffered from Hurricane Melissa last year are to benefit from a US$50,000 donation being made available by Alpha Phi Alpha, the oldest black fraternity in the United States (US).

The schools to benefit are Munro College, Westwood High School for Girls and St Hilda’s.

The funds were handed over during a ceremony held at the Jamaican Consulate in Manhattan last Thursday afternoon. Handing over the funds was the general treasurer of Alpha Phi Alpha, Dr Ainsley Reynolds. It was received on behalf of the schools by the president of the Union of Jamaican Alumni Associations, Donovan Wilson, and Debbie Mercer-Miller.

Both Wilson and Mercer-Miller said that the funds will be used to pay contractors who will be carrying out repairs to the schools. They stressed that it would not be routed through the Ministry of Education, Skills, Youth and Information.

According to Mercer-Miller, who took the lead in securing the donation, the principal of Munro has identified the reconstruction of two computer labs, the fixing of the roof and the floors as priority areas for repairs, among other needs.

She said that she was still in discussions with the principals of Westwood and St Hilda’s to determine the most urgent needs for both schools.

She said the aim was to make sure that the donation is impactful and for the schools to benefit.

“With respect to Munro, we are getting quotes from the contractors so we can identify and begin the work to be done,” she said.

Wilson said that disbursement of the funds may not be in equal instalments to the schools, depending on the needs of each of the three institutions.

“We need to see the benefit derived from the donation,” he said.

Reynolds said his organisation has always supported education, health and other areas, and expressed his delight that schools in Jamaica would benefit from the donation, given the ties between Alpha Phi Alpha and Jamaica going back to 1947, when National Hero Norman Manley spoke at the fraternity’s function.

Reynolds, whose parents are Jamaicans, said both Norman Manley and his son, the late former Prime Minister Michael Manley, were members of the fraternity.

He said he believes that a chapter of the fraternity was previously in Jamaica, and expressed the hope to once again revive such a chapter.

Alpha Phi Alpha, the first intercollegiate Greek-letter fraternity established for African American men, was founded on December 4, 1906 at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, by seven college men who recognised the need for a strong bond of brotherhood among African descendants in the country. The founders were known as the ‘Jewels’, and they established the fraternity to combat racial discrimination and promote scholarship, fellowship, good character, and the uplifting of humanity.

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