Newly-appointed British Overseas Territories Minister, Mark Simmonds, heard a strong case for the funding of the planned new Community College campus when he met with President of the Institution, Professor Delroy Louden. Others at the meeting were Governor Alistair Harrison; Chief Minister, Hubert Hughes; Minister of Education, Edison Baird; Permanent Secretary, Mrs. Chanelle Petty-Barrett; and members of the Board of Governors.
The British Minister, on a 24-hour visit to Anguilla on Wednesday and Thursday last week, visited the Community College at George Hill to familiarise himself with the institution, and its plans for expansion at its coming new premises at Long Path, Sandy Hill.
“My task, Minister, is to very quickly persuade you on some of our needs and to ask you to use your good offices [to assist us],” Professor Louden said. He was at the time explaining the demands on the college to respond to the educational needs of both the Anguillian community and the region.
Professor Louden spoke about the establishment of the college, plans for its future development, the wide range of courses it offers, and the provision of 11.97 acres of land by the Anguilla Government to accommodate the institution at its own premises later on. He said that while the college had made a number of strides in several areas, it was faced withvarious disadvantages. These included limited space for class sizes and limited human resources to provide all the necessary services.
“We are sustained by funding from the Government of Anguilla to the tune of one million seven hundred and eighty-seven thousand dollars over a period of time and our rent is quite high, Minister,” Professor Loudon told Mr. Simmonds. “If we could get your good office’s blessing to borrow the amount of money we need to put up our own building, we would be able to cut out that [rental] cost, and cost-effectively pay off our mortgage over a fifteen-year period.” He also spoke about the ability of the college to raise its own revenue, thus reducing its dependency on Government’s assistance.
Professor Loudon said that one of the challenges facing the college was that, as a result of Anguilla being an Overseas Territory, some of the external funding available to the college, through the scholarly writing of grants, was not accessible. He said the Caribbean Development Bank had agreed to provide the money for the college (US $2,000,000) and that all the necessary requirements, including the quantity survey, architectural drawings and planning approval, had already been met.
He appealed to theUKMinister to allow the college to access the CDB loan, stressing that it was a very time-sensitive matter with the expiry date being December 31. He indicated that Mr. Simmonds’ predecessor, Henry Bellingham, had approved the request to borrow the money and all that was needed was to actually access the funds. Professor Loudon also told Mr. Simmonds that the British Virgin Islands had obtained a number of grants to build their community college and he wondered whether the Minister could assist Anguilla to obtain some of the same grants or alternatively from the Jubilee Fund.
He also requested technical assistance from the UK Government to assist the college to develop a curriculum for teaching financial services courses and to actually deliver the tutoring.
“I was very pleased to come to the community college firstly to understand the work you already do to develop students’ skills and education, but also the ambitions aspirations that you have for the future,” Mr Simmonds responded. “I am very keen to assist if I can and certainly my understanding of the loan that you have applied for has been approved by the UK Government subject of the signing between the Government of Anguilla and the Government of theUK. [This is about] the Financial and Fiscal Framework which I hope the civil servants will agree [to] and that we can sign that within the time scale that you are talking about. So I think that is quite positive.”
With respect to Professor Louden’s request for additional assistance under the Jubilee Fund, the UK Minister said: “I very keenly urge you to apply for a grant, setting out the specifics how you like to spend it and we will look at that very closely. So that is definitely a very positive aspect.” In terms of the college itself, he asked Professor Louden whether, in the context of the new building, there were additional areas he wished to work on, relating to curriculum development; and whether there was any way that theUKcould help to create a link with other educational colleges in theUK, particular those with expertise in financial services. Mr. Simmonds said he was very impressed with the number of students attending the college and wondered whether there were additional demands by students which the college was unable to meet.
Professor Louden replied that the college was not in a position to host the Sixth Form students from the Albena Lake-Hodge Comprehensive School as planned, but that would change with the provision of the new building. He identified early childhood education as another area where assistance was needed.
“In the design of the building, Board member Mr. Vanburn Brooks, has put in an Early Childhood Education Centre,” Professor Louden stated. “Twenty-four children will be taken in and students in the academic programme will run the centre themselves under supervision…” He also spoke about offering the City & Guilds programme particularly with respect to plumbing, masonry, construction and electrical skills, saying the training was required by the tourism industry for a host of manpower personnel.
TheUKMinister was told that construction work on the building for the community college was estimated to be completed within eighteen months. This was particularly so as an existing building (the factory shell) was already on the site and would form part of the superstructure.Among other things, it would result in substantial savings.
TheUKMinister, who appeared to be quite pleased with the initiatives of theAnguillaCommunity College, requested Dr. Louden to provide him with “a bullet-point summary of exactly the key areas for delivering the curriculum and those areas which would be most helpful to get support in a partnership arrangement with theUK.”
The Minister added that the information would be helpful to him to ensure that the community college was matched with the rightUKeducational institution.
Chief Hughes commented, among other matters, that for years Anguilla had been battling with human resource development and the Government had provided land and other resources for the community college as a means to meet that need. “We have lost out on a lot of money which we would have been able to source from developers in the past because they also saw the need to develop the human resource so that they could have qualified expertise within other operations,” he said. He regretted that Anguilla,being an Overseas Territory, was not permitted to source such assistance. He expressed the hope that in time that situation would change.
