Af­ter 34 years of in­spir­ing young minds, beloved teacher Nazrudeen Baksh bid his stu­dents a heartwrench­ing farewell dur­ing Debe Sec­ondary School’s grad­u­a­tion last Fri­day.

The cer­e­mo­ny, ti­tled Oceans of Op­por­tu­ni­ties, un­fold­ed in the school’s au­di­to­ri­um be­neath an over­cast sky. Yet, the weath­er couldn’t damp­en the grad­u­ates’ spir­its, as they joy­ful­ly took their seats, ready to em­brace the fu­ture with hope and en­thu­si­asm.

De­liv­er­ing greet­ings, prin­ci­pal Romeo Gun­ness paid trib­ute to Baksh, laud­ing him for his pas­sion and ded­i­ca­tion to the school over the years. He said Baksh al­so taught at Bar­rack­pore West Sec­ondary and Rio Claro Sec­ondary where he de­vot­ed his love and per­son­al time to help­ing poor chil­dren.

“Nazrudeen is well-known for his ex­cep­tion­al hu­man re­la­tions skills, speed, ef­fi­cien­cy, and his ca­pac­i­ty to serve be­yond the call of du­ty. He was an all-rounder, skil­ful­ly re­pair­ing and build­ing book­shelves and cup­boards, re­design­ing the Tech Ed room, and rein­vent­ing spaces. A true and de­pend­able friend and cowork­er, he did this with a com­pas­sion­ate and gen­er­ous spir­it,” Gun­ness re­called.

He not­ed that Baksh’s jovial spir­it and good hu­mour char­ac­terised his work eth­ic.

“While his jokes were quirky, they of­ten fu­elled our spir­its to com­plete a hard day’s work. From him, we learned to stop and recog­nise our cowork­ers, friends, and peers as one body with a com­mon mis­sion.”

Vale­dic­to­ri­an Sum­mer-Lee Lash­ley urged her peers to hold on­to the val­ues they learned at Debe Sec­ondary School.

She re­called their long nights of study and how every­one worked to­geth­er to help one an­oth­er.

Chair­man of the lo­cal school board, Ken Em­rith, praised the prin­ci­pal for his lead­er­ship in mak­ing Debe Sec­ondary one of the top schools in South Trinidad. Em­rith said the school was in high de­mand for trans­fers and place­ments and was re­gard­ed as a first-choice school by many.

Mean­while, Oropouche East MP Dr Roodal Mooni­lal who al­so de­liv­ered greet­ings en­cour­aged the grad­u­ates to seize their op­por­tu­ni­ties and be­lieve in them­selves. He em­pha­sised the im­por­tance of self-con­fi­dence and urged them to up­hold the val­ues of in­tegri­ty and moral­i­ty in­stilled at Debe Sec­ondary.

Fea­ture speak­er Jus­tice Robin Mo­hammed echoed Dr Mooni­lal’s sen­ti­ments, re­mind­ing stu­dents nev­er to com­pro­mise their in­tegri­ty as they en­ter a new stage of their lives. 

Mer­it awards and spe­cial awards were giv­en to top stu­dents. Sharona Di­noo re­ceived a spe­cial award for out­stand­ing aca­d­e­m­ic per­for­mance in CSEC 2023 while Akel­la Vic­tor earned an award for top stu­dent in CAPE 2023. Top achiev­ers Abi­ah Al­leyne, Jen­na Box­ill, Naio­mi Mo­hammed, Aneela Lack­path, and Alyssa Lee-Charles all re­ceived spe­cial awards for out­stand­ing aca­d­e­m­ic achieve­ments. 

The prin­ci­pal’s cup went to Anant Kissoon­dath, of Up­per Six.