Tourism Min­is­ter Ran­dall Mitchell has laud­ed a for­mer Stan­dard Five stu­dent of the San Fer­nan­do TML Pri­ma­ry school for win­ning an in­ter­na­tion­al art com­pe­ti­tion and beat­ing out stu­dents from 16 coun­tries across the world.

Su­van Sub­ance, who wrote the Sec­ondary En­trance As­sess­ment ex­am­i­na­tions this year and passed for Na­pari­ma Col­lege, en­tered the Flori­da Caribbean Cruise As­so­ci­a­tion en­vi­ron­men­tal poster con­test last year while he at­tend­ed San Fer­nan­do TML.

The theme of the con­test was “Our World is Pre­cious, Save our Land and Seas.”

Mitchell said for Su­van’s ex­cep­tion­al work of art, he won the first-place prize of US$3,000. The school, which emerged as the top school in the 2020 Sec­ondary En­trance As­sess­ment ex­ams, al­so won the first-place prize of US$3,000.

In an in­ter­view with Guardian Me­dia, Act­ing Prin­ci­pal of San Fer­nan­do TML Pri­ma­ry School Wahi­da Mo­hammed- Nar­ine said Su­van was a “re­mark­able artist” who had par­tic­i­pat­ed in sev­er­al art com­pe­ti­tions at the school.

These in­clud­ed the Trash Art com­pe­ti­tion host­ed by the San Fer­nan­do City Cor­po­ra­tion, the North­west Re­gion­al Health Au­thor­i­ty Mt Hope Ma­lig­nant Unit’s Tho­racic Lung Can­cer Poster Com­pe­ti­tion, San Fest and ABCD – Art by Cre­ative De­sign com­pe­ti­tion.

His piece on the lat­ter com­pe­ti­tion was ex­hib­it­ed, Mo­hammed-Nar­ine said.

De­scrib­ing the for­mer TML stu­dents as a “tal­ent­ed, hum­ble young man with a keen in­ter­est in the arts and a love for his en­vi­ron­ment,” the prin­ci­pal said Su­van was able to hone his ex­tra­or­di­nary gift in art over the years.

“His school TML Pri­ma­ry School San Fer­nan­do is tru­ly proud of him,” Mo­hammed-Nar­ine said.

She al­so praised his class teacher Shaz­ara Mo­hammed and Ra­bia Mo­hammed un­der whose tute­lage, Ameera Beekhoo emerged the top SEA stu­dent in the coun­try.

Mean­while, San Fer­nan­do May­or Ju­nia Re­grel­lo al­so ho­n­oured Beekhoo of the San Fer­nan­do TML Pri­ma­ry School and sec­ond place SEA win­ner, An­janaa Dan from Trinidad Re­nais­sance Prepara­to­ry School last week­end. 

The stu­dents re­ceived a ci­ta­tion from the City laud­ing their achieve­ment as well as copies of two books- Ana­pari­ma: The His­to­ry of San Fer­nan­do and Its En­vi­rons by Michael An­tho­ny, as well as, a lo­cal adap­ta­tion of works by William Shake­speare in Lo­cal Habi­ta­tion and Name by Deb­o­rah Jean-Bap­tiste Samuel. As he con­grat­u­lat­ed them, Re­grel­lo al­so gave them a CD con­tain­ing sev­er­al na­tion­al songs.