RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

rad­hi­ca.sookraj@guardian.co.tt

It's a school that has topped this coun­try's Sec­ondary En­trance As­sess­ment Ex­am­i­na­tions six times be­tween 1973 to 2020, 11 times in the top 3 places, con­sis­tent­ly plac­ing in the Top Na­tion­al Place­ment List with the high­est num­ber of stu­dents na­tion­al­ly and the High­est Na­tion­al Av­er­ages in the sub­ject ar­eas. 

And as the Trinidad Mus­lim League (TML) Pri­ma­ry School San Fer­nan­do cel­e­brat­ed its 70th Plat­inum Ju­bilee an­niver­sary last Thurs­day, the sec­re­tary of the TML School Board, Farouk Khan made a re­sound­ing call on the Min­istry of Ed­u­ca­tion to pre­serve the sanc­ti­ty of the Con­cor­dat.

Speak­ing to Guardian Me­dia fol­low­ing a Shukrana (thanks­giv­ing) prayer ses­sion at the school, Khan said de­nom­i­na­tion­al schools across the coun­try have thrived be­cause there is a bal­ance of sec­u­lar ed­u­ca­tion and spir­i­tu­al­i­ty. He paid trib­ute to all the past school man­agers and prin­ci­pals in­clud­ing the late for­mer Pres­i­dent of T&T Noor Has­sanali, and the last school man­ag­er Sher­az Mu­radali who served for 40 years be­fore his pass­ing.

Prais­ing the teach­ers of TML San Fer­nan­do, Khan said dili­gence was part of the TML's phi­los­o­phy.

Like many oth­er schools, Khan ex­plained that chil­dren may come to school with all sorts of prob­lems.

"But with lov­ing teach­ers and a struc­tured learn­ing en­vi­ron­ment, they are giv­en as­sis­tance to man­age their is­sues," he ex­plained.

Khan not­ed that ex­tra-cur­ric­u­lar ac­tiv­i­ties were im­por­tant, say­ing TML San Fer­nan­do has at­tained many ac­co­lades. These in­clude the Na­tion­al Chess cham­pi­onships; Na­tion­al San­fest Win­ners/Best Pri­ma­ry School 2022; Largest Cub Pack Na­tion­al­ly; Pres­i­dent’s Awards; Largest Ara­bic Class Na­tion­al­ly, Read­ers of Al Quran: Na­tion­al Swim­ming Cham­pi­on; Na­tion­al Spelling, OW­TU, Red Cross, Di­a­betes; Re­li­gious Knowl­edge and Es­say Writ­ing Com­pe­ti­tions with­in re­cent times. 

Mean­while, school prin­ci­pal Wahi­da Mo­hammed- Nar­ine con­grat­u­lat­ed all the stake­hold­ers on the 70th an­niver­sary. 

"Over the past sev­en decades, the school has been pro­vid­ing a strong foun­da­tion to nur­ture and mould young minds. It is our goal to en­sure that each stu­dent re­al­izes his or her fullest po­ten­tial," Mo­hammed-Nar­ine said, added: "We want each child to de­vel­op the skills that mat­ter most - the abil­i­ty to con­nect ideas, cre­ate new knowl­edge, en­gage in ef­fec­tive com­mu­ni­ca­tion through col­lab­o­ra­tion, and be crit­i­cal thinkers with the abil­i­ty to de­vel­op metacog­ni­tive skills. But most im­por­tant­ly de­vel­op good morals and val­ues and by putting God first in all your un­der­tak­ing “. 

Mo­hammed-Nar­ine, who has been act­ing as prin­ci­pal for the past five years said the school will con­tin­ue to en­sure that every child be­comes a life­long learn­er. 

She re­it­er­at­ed that, "Through col­lab­o­ra­tion, we will en­sure each child reach­es their fullest aca­d­e­m­ic po­ten­tial by de­liv­er­ing an en­rich­ing, en­gag­ing cur­ricu­lum through our in­spir­ing teach­ers and group lead­ers in the best-worked en­vi­ron­ment," she added.

Mo­hammed-Nar­ine said: "The col­lab­o­ra­tive school en­vi­ron­ment draws on the strength of all stake­hold­ers and fos­ters a pos­i­tive school cli­mate that makes a dif­fer­ence in the lives of our stu­dents."

David Nar­ine, past stu­dent and re­tired Ag. Vice Prin­ci­pal of the school de­liv­ered the fea­ture ad­dress at the func­tion. 

He gave a brief in-depth his­to­ry of the school from its in­cep­tion at the Masjid Hall on Prince Al­bert Street to its cur­rent lo­ca­tion on Farah Street in San Fer­nan­do. 

He re­mind­ed the au­di­ence of the per­se­ver­ance and courage of the 

pre­de­ces­sors who com­mit­ted over the years to­wards the suc­cess of the school. Nar­ine ad­vised all stu­dents to step up to the next lev­el and use the in­sti­tu­tion to help de­vel­op them­selves to their op­ti­mum po­ten­tial.  

He fur­ther en­cour­aged all ed­u­ca­tors and sup­port staff at the school to con­tin­ue to forge ahead with ded­i­ca­tion and com­mit­ment and to con­tin­ue the ex­cel­lent work.

Nar­ine said he was hap­py to re­turn to the in­sti­tu­tion where he spent 36 years, to not on­ly re­unite with his col­leagues but to con­nect with stu­dents. Due to ris­ing Covid cas­es, the school an­niver­sary func­tion took place with few­er guests but more events are sched­uled for lat­er in the year.