BASSETERRE, ST. KITTS, September 20, 2022 (MMS-SKN) — The St. Kitts Nevis Anguilla Trading and Development Company (TDC) Limited’s Warren Tyson Memorial Scholarship Programme, launched in 1981, has offered equal opportunities to children from poor families who are now making significant strides in nation building — and among its beneficiaries are the fourth Prime Minister of the Federation, the Honourable Dr Terrance Drew, and world-acclaimed photographer Professor Valdon Tau Battice. PM Drew made the observation on Wednesday September 14 at the St. Kitts Marriott Resort when he met Professor Battice, who was the featured speaker at the Prime Minister’s Independence Lecture Series.
“Tau and I benefitted from that programme as young school boys. I started in 1989. When I went there I met Tau, the speaker for tonight’s event, and that scholarship was very, very important at that time,” said PM Drew. The scholarship covered five years of Dr Drew’s high school education at the Basseterre Junior High School and Basseterre High School and two years at the Sixth Form College. “So many of those things that Tau and I learnt that we may not have been able to learn in our own homes, we were able to learn in the TDC environment and those teachings have been with us and have carried us tremendously in our own personal lives,” said the Prime Minister. Professor Battice, who joined the scholarship programme in 1985, said: “The Warren Tyson Memorial Scholarship saw something in us. Look at us now — I mean, it is not responsible for what we became, but they put us in an environment that allowed us to make it. It was an environment of validation because for me that scholarship meant that you were bright, hence winning it over other people in the running. That is where I am now — gratitude.”