Graduation day was bittersweet for staff and students of the College of Science, Technology and Applied Arts of T&T (Costaatt), who paid a moving tribute to missing lecturer, Glenda Charles-Harris, by singing, for the very first time, a school song which she composed.
Charles-Harris, a senior lecturer and head of the Environmental Studies Department, has been missing for almost four months. She was last seen leaving her home at Blue Range, Diego Martin, on July 27.
Since then, staff and students at the school have handed out flyers hoping for information on her whereabouts. The missing lecturer’s car was found abandoned in Princes Town a day after she disappeared.
Valedictorian Arnold Ramkaran spoke about how much he and his classmates missed Charles-Harris and continued hoping for her safe return. Costaatt president Dr Gillian Paul said more than 1,400 students graduated this year—the largest in the school’s 15-year history.
“Excellence does not come from where you start, excellence comes from inside. Anyone can be excellent. You are all examples of excellence,” she said.
Dr Paul said when Costaatt was established in 2000, the University of the West Indies was the only public university in T&T. Costaatt, modelled after community colleges in the US, became a school of second chances for students to pursue higher education.
While the school admits students who do not have A’s, she added the calibre of its graduates is excellent and it is the duty of every Costaatt student to go out in the world and show their excellence.
“Today, when you graduate, you have an important responsibility. You are a Costaatt graduate and there may be a person in the society who tend to have assumptions about what Costaat graduates can do but I tell you with utter confidence that this is an institution that defies expectations every day because you all do extraordinary things every day.
“Our faculty believes it, you know you can do it and when you leave here with your degree and go back to work, it is actually your responsibility to help Trinidad and Tobago understand where excellence comes from,” Dr Paul said.
Keynote speaker Nyan Gadsby-Dolly, Minister of Community, Culture and the Arts, a former lecturer in the Natural Science faculty, spoke about the transformative power of education.
Among the graduates was CNC3’s weather anchor Seigonie Mohammed who gained an Associates of Applied Science Degree in Journalism and Public Relations with honours.