Rad­hi­ca De Sil­va

Se­nior Re­porter

rad­hi­ca.sookraj@guardian.co.tt

High Court Judge Jus­tice Frank Seep­er­sad has is­sued a strong call for pri­ma­ry school grad­u­ates to re­ject and re­port bul­ly­ing as they tran­si­tion in­to sec­ondary school, echo­ing re­cent na­tion­al con­cerns over vi­o­lence and in­tim­i­da­tion in schools.

Speak­ing to the grad­u­at­ing class of the Canaan Pres­by­ter­ian School held at the Susamachar Pres­by­ter­ian Church on Wednes­day, Jus­tice Seep­er­sad en­cour­aged pupils to soar de­spite ad­ver­si­ty.

“Take a no tol­er­ance to bul­ly­ing,” he said, adding, “If you see bul­ly­ing or you are bul­lied, re­port it im­me­di­ate­ly to your teach­ers and your par­ents. Bul­lies feed on fear. Do not suc­cumb and be­come a vic­tim. Call them out so that they can be helped and be held ac­count­able.”

His re­marks come amid a wave of bul­ly­ing in­ci­dents that have sur­faced across schools in T&T. Over the past few weeks, sev­er­al school fights have gone vi­ral, prompt­ing na­tion­al out­cry. There was a firm re­sponse on the is­sue from Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar, who last Thurs­day de­clared that bul­lies would face ex­pul­sion from schools.

Jus­tice Seep­er­sad said courage and sup­port were nec­es­sary when fac­ing peer pres­sure and ag­gres­sive be­hav­iour.

“You have to de­vel­op the abil­i­ty to bounce back and to re­solve that you will keep go­ing. You need to have a healthy dose of de­fi­ance and you must be pre­pared to con­front dis­ap­point­ment, fail­ure and some­times even dan­ger as you pur­sue your cho­sen path,” he said.

The judge al­so re­mind­ed stu­dents that their val­ue is not de­ter­mined by the school they at­tend in Sep­tem­ber.

“The school that you will at­tend in Sep­tem­ber will not de­fine the adult cit­i­zens that you will even­tu­al­ly be­come, nor will it af­fect your val­ue or im­por­tance,” he said.

He en­cour­aged the stu­dents to be­lieve in their po­ten­tial, re­ject fear, and fo­cus on col­lab­o­ra­tion, in­tegri­ty, and re­silience as they pre­pare for sec­ondary school life.

“To soar, you must be­lieve in the great­ness that ex­ists with­in you,” he added.

He al­so high­light­ed ex­am­ples of na­tion­al lead­ers who rose from mod­est be­gin­nings, in­clud­ing the cur­rent prime min­is­ter, who over­came per­son­al chal­lenges and ge­o­graph­i­cal bar­ri­ers.

“Two lit­tle boys from hum­ble fam­i­lies in the rur­al com­mu­ni­ties of Cas­tara and Ma­son Hall emerged as prime min­is­ters. Our cur­rent prime min­is­ter faced try­ing cir­cum­stances in Siparia but was per­sis­tent, and she per­se­vered,” he added.

He urged them not to fear fail­ure.

“Form a healthy re­la­tion­ship with re­jec­tion and un­der­stand that it is part of the learn­ing process of life, but al­ways re­main strong and res­olute as you fol­low your dreams,” he added.

He urged them to de­fine their own ver­sion of suc­cess and com­mit to per­son­al re­spon­si­bil­i­ty while keep­ing close to God.

“When your at­ti­tude fo­cus­es up­on in­tegri­ty and kind­ness, good­ness and God’s grace will sus­tain you, and the peo­ple around you will re­spect you. As a con­se­quence, your path will be less tur­bu­lent,” he added.

Al­so speak­ing at the func­tion were school prin­ci­pal Ophe­lia Gan­ga-Sieu­raj and PTA pres­i­dent Stan Smith.