RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

When Kubair Ram­per­sad up­root­ed his fam­i­ly and moved to San Fer­nan­do to es­cape the blar­ing mu­sic from a near­by rum shop, he nev­er imag­ined their sac­ri­fices would one day pave the way for his daugh­ter, Kesh­ma Ram­per­sad, to earn an Open Schol­ar­ship in In­for­ma­tion and Com­mu­ni­ca­tion Tech­nol­o­gy (ICT).

Ram­per­sad, one of five Na­pari­ma Girls’ High School stu­dents to earn schol­ar­ships this year, re­called how dif­fi­cult it was to study in their Pe­nal Rock Road home.

Her fa­ther Kubair, Pres­i­dent of the Pe­nal Rock Bun­see Trace Vil­lage Coun­cil, suc­ceed­ed in bring­ing pipe-borne wa­ter to the com­mu­ni­ty. How­ev­er, he could not stop the noise pol­lu­tion.

“Usu­al­ly, the speak­ers were blast­ing, and if you com­plained, they would turn it up even more. I had ear surgery as a child, and with all that noise, it was im­pos­si­ble to con­cen­trate. My par­ents re­alised it was time for a change, and in 2019, we moved to San Fer­nan­do," she added.

Now 18 and pur­su­ing a de­gree in Com­put­er Sci­ence at The Uni­ver­si­ty of the West In­dies, Ram­per­sad said she has dreams of work­ing at NASA or Google. The schol­ar­ship, she said, came as a sur­prise.

“I didn’t ex­pect it. A lot of peo­ple told me I might, but I didn’t want to get my hopes up. When I heard the news, I was in shock. It’s a huge achieve­ment, but more than that, it’s a way to ho­n­our my par­ents’ sac­ri­fices," she said wip­ing away tears.

Ram­per­sad said her sup­port from her par­ents shaped her suc­cess.

“My par­ents nev­er pushed me to do any­thing spe­cif­ic. From preschool, they just told me to do my best," she added.

She al­so cred­it­ed her younger sis­ter, Eli­na, for be­ing her con­stant en­cour­age­ment. “She’s like my dad, fun­ny and al­ways sup­port­ive, but she al­so has my mom’s kind­ness. She would help me prac­tice Physics for­mu­las and even Span­ish and French orals, even though she didn’t un­der­stand it."

Ram­per­sad shared her method for suc­cess.

“Past pa­pers, past pa­pers, past pa­pers—that’s the key,” she said.

She ad­vised stu­dents to find their strengths and fo­cus on what ex­cites them. “I don’t like read­ing or re­gur­gi­tat­ing in­for­ma­tion, but I love math­e­mat­i­cal cal­cu­la­tions and prob­lem-solv­ing. My ad­vice is to pick some­thing prac­ti­cal that you en­joy and work at it. The goal is to get a job and make a life for your­self, so choose some­thing that comes nat­u­ral­ly to you.”

She ex­pressed grat­i­tude to her teach­ers Fari­ah Hy­atali and Maris­sa Po­li­ah who were her men­tors and her prin­ci­pal, Karen Bal­ly.

Mean­while, her fa­ther Kubair, who is a Physics teacher, said it was dif­fi­cult to leave Bun­see Trace.

"I was born there and lived there for 45 years. Leav­ing was hard but it was in the chil­dren’s best in­ter­est," he said.

Kesh­ma's moth­er, In­di­ra Heer­ah-Ram­per­sad, said she is proud of her daugh­ter. “Deep down, I al­ways knew she could achieve any­thing she set her mind to. She’s lov­ing, re­spect­ful, and de­ter­mined,” she said.

Ram­per­sad's teacher Fari­ah Hy­atali de­scribed her as a re­mark­able young la­dy who served as the Pres­i­dent of the Red Cross Club.

"Un­der her lead­er­ship, we achieved so much, in­clud­ing dis­trib­ut­ing 130 bags of Christ­mas treats and spend­ing a mem­o­rable day con­nect­ing with the chil­dren at San Fer­nan­do Methodist Pri­ma­ry," Hy­atali said.

She said in 2022, Ram­per­sad earned an im­pres­sive 12 Grade Ones at CSEC which earned her the Pres­i­dent's Medal Gold. She said de­spite her many ac­com­plish­ments, Ram­per­sad con­tin­ues to be hum­ble.