Jensen La Vende
St Francis Boys College, formerly Belmont Boys Secondary, is seeking to use the funds from this year's Carnival fete - Straight Out Of Belmont Cooler Fete - to upgrade the school.
The event, which began in 2019, has been used as a fundraiser which saw the growth of its music department. With all proceeds going towards the upkeep of the school, the promoters told Guardian Media that after the first event, it was able to convert the outdated technical drawing room into a modern-day Auto Cad (computer-aided drawing) facility.
Former principal Lucia Reyes-Griffith said the planned usage for the 2020 event was changed due to the pandemic, but the primary focus was on the music room.
"We had targeted the music room for improvement, but the pandemic hit, and instead, the funds were used to purchase new furniture for the forms one and two classes, to assist families of the school impacted by loss/reduction of employment and to employ extra staff in the office to do all the added paperwork required for the transition to online learning."
In 2022, a pan-arranger/musician and teacher at the school, Desmond Waithe, died. Waithe was an inspiration to the school. This was shown when they won all the categories of the Music Festival the following year.
"We wish to continue that upward trend since we do get many very talented musicians in the intake every year who come from schools like St Margaret’s (the recently crowned the Primary School Panorama Champions for the 12th time) and Rosary Boys RC," Reyes-Griffith said.
She added that this year's proceeds will go towards the music room to repair leaks and to soundproof it as well proper storage is needed for musical instruments.
The event takes place at the Government Campus, Richmond Street, Port-of-Spain. There will be live performances by soca artistes Nadia Batson, Mical Teja, Bunji Garlin and Fay-Ann Alvarez.
The food-inclusive cooler event takes place on Sunday from 5 pm to 11 pm.
