Sascha Wil­son

Se­nior Re­porter

sascha.wil­son@guardian.co.tt

Krisann Be­dassie, 17, has made his­to­ry by be­com­ing the first stu­dent from T&T to be ac­cept­ed in­to the pres­ti­gious Yale Young Glob­al Schol­ars Pro­gramme.

How­ev­er, al­though she re­ceived a mer­it-based schol­ar­ship cov­er­ing tu­ition, ac­com­mo­da­tion and health­care, the Form 5 St Joseph Con­vent, San Fer­nan­do, stu­dent still needs ap­prox­i­mate­ly US$4,000 to make this once-in-a-life­time op­por­tu­ni­ty a re­al­i­ty.

The two-week pro­gramme is a high­ly se­lec­tive aca­d­e­m­ic en­rich­ment ini­tia­tive for out­stand­ing high school stu­dents from across the globe. The ses­sion, which runs from Ju­ly 6 to 18, will fo­cus on law, pol­i­tics, and eco­nom­ics—sub­jects close to Krisann’s heart.

“I am very ex­cit­ed be­cause Yale is an Ivy League uni­ver­si­ty and this stands as an ac­com­plish­ment not just for me but all of Trinidad and To­ba­go be­cause I am the first ad­mit­ted stu­dent from Trinidad and To­ba­go,” she said.

Her ac­cep­tance was based on aca­d­e­m­ic ex­cel­lence with an ex­cep­tion­al GPA and a broad port­fo­lio of ex­tracur­ric­u­lar ac­tiv­i­ties.

As a 2024 Na­tion­al Youth Award re­cip­i­ent in the cat­e­go­ry of Health and Well­ness, a Sus­tain­able De­vel­op­ment Goal Am­bas­sador for UN­ESCO, and an award­ed spo­ken word artiste, she had to prob­lem qual­i­fy­ing for the schol­ar­ship.

Be­cause she is a mi­nor, she wants her moth­er to ac­com­pa­ny her for safe­ty rea­sons. How­ev­er, they re­quire ad­di­tion­al funds for ac­com­mo­da­tions. “If you could help some­body then why should you de­cline them that op­por­tu­ni­ty? I am not ask­ing for a $1 mil­lion. I am just ask­ing for a sub­stan­tial con­tri­bu­tion to make my dream a re­al­i­ty be­cause this serves as a big deal for me and our coun­try and I would re­al­ly like to take ad­van­tage of the op­por­tu­ni­ty. So, if you can help me, I would re­al­ly ap­pre­ci­ate it,” she urged.

Krisann, who hopes to pur­sue a ca­reer as a UN am­bas­sador, be­lieves in ad­vo­cat­ing for those who can­not.

“I’ve been ed­u­cat­ed about the im­por­tance of us­ing your voice for the right things. I don’t want to be left be­hind when piv­otal de­ci­sions are be­ing made be­cause I un­der­stand the im­por­tance of these de­ci­sions. I have de­cid­ed to learn about pol­i­tics, law, and eco­nom­ics not just be­cause they in­ter­est me, but be­cause I want to help achieve a bet­ter Trinidad and To­ba­go.”

Her moth­er, Su­san­nah Be­dassie, a sin­gle par­ent and hair­dress­er, said Krisann has re­mained fo­cused de­spite many chal­lenges. “She is com­mit­ted to mak­ing this world a bet­ter place, and I’m tru­ly thank­ful for that,” she said proud­ly. Al­though their tick­ets were spon­sored by a pri­vate donor, Krisann is dis­ap­point­ed at the lack of sup­port from cor­po­rate en­ti­ties. She sent out more then 80 emails seek­ing as­sis­tance but got no re­sponse.

“I am still thank­ful be­cause I be­lieve that if God has brought us this far, he would fin­ish it,” said Krisann.

Any­one will­ing to as­sist can do­nate funds to the First Cit­i­zens Bank ac­count num­ber 1984690, or con­tact Krisann and her moth­er at 336-2805.