On Monday, 30 April 2012 at the Red Bay Holiness Church, the John Gray High School held its annual award ceremony for its Year 11 students.

Over 200 awards were given to those students who excelled in academics, gave excellent effort or improved and excelled in sports.

Each received awards in single subjects, double (two subjects) or multiple (three plus subjects). These awards represented their specific strengths in the given subject areas.  Other awards for excellence throughout the years spent at John Gray were also handed out.  One such award was to Chrishanna Trowers for reading 76 books throughout the school year.

An important announcement was made at the ceremony whereby this year’s students could be the first to celebrate a standard of excellence not only for the Cayman Islands but throughout the Caribbean. It has been predicted, based on the last semester’s report cards, that over 42 percent of the Year 11 class is scheduled to receive five or more external examination passes.

Ms. Lyneth Monteith, Principal of John Gray commended the students on the successful way that they balanced school demands, exam preparation and extra-curricular activities, excelling in all areas.  Along with her congratulations to the students, she provided them with some words of advice quoting, Mahatma Gandhi, “The future depends on what we do in the present.”  She continued, “Your future depends on what you do today.  You are going to sit your external exams which will open up certain pathways for you.  These may be pathways which allow you to continue to progress or pathways which require you to revisit what you have already done in order to progress.”

Minister for Education, Training and Employment, the Hon. Rolston Anglin and Ministry Chief Officer Mrs. Mary Rodrigues attended and congratulated each of the students who received rewards.

The Minister stated, “The next few weeks are crucially important for you and your academic career. You have an opportunity to go down in history for our islands. I would like each of you to go to these upcoming exams and exceed our expectations. Set a mark so that every year after you will have a milestone to reach or exceed!”

The Minister continued to address the students, saying: “Support each other to succeed. This is really only the beginning for you all and I believe each and every one of you can set the standard for public schools in the Cayman Islands.”

(GIS)