This year’s recruitment of students who will participate in the Junior Achievement Company as well as volunteers has got off to a great start with the annual visits to the schools by JA Program Director Ms. Teresa Foster and JA President Mr. Paul Byles.

“The school visits are our annual introduction and call to action to the potential students, explains Mr Byles. We provide information usually during the school assembly period to students in years 10 to 13. We had great success last year with over 320 students participating in our very popular Company program and our goal is to achieve similar success again this year”, he added.

Visits have already been made to schools within the first 2 weeks of the term to Clifton Hunter, John Gray, Triple C, Grace Christian Academy, Wesleyan Academy, St Ignatius, CIS and Cayman Prep & High School over the past few weeks. A recent visit was also made to Cayman Brac to recruit teachers, parents and other members of the local community as volunteers.

Ms. Teresa Foster says that securing companies to sponsor the students’ companies as well as advisors to the students is an equally important part of the focus at this time of the year.  “We need as many advisors and company sponsors as possible, and we are targeting 12 to 13 company sponsors this year in order to accommodate our expectations in terms of student numbers,” said Ms. Foster.

Byles says that meeting with potential financial sponsors for the Junior Achievement Program is another big focus for this year. We are trying to secure several additional ‘Corporate Ambassadors’ for Junior Achievement this year and as well as other sponsors as this financial support has been key to our success over the past 22 years,” he said.

He explained that while a lot of people are familiar with the JA Company Program in which over 250 to 300 students participate annually, the Junior Achievement program in the Cayman Islands also delivers a number of other programmes in the high schools, middle schools and more recently in kindergarten that influences a further 1,000 students in the country’s school system.

“It’s a mammoth task when you consider the sheer amount of students that participate and its all down to the hard work of volunteer advisors, teachers, parents and of course the students. It’s a remarkable achievement in terms of the positive experience and lessons taught to over 1,300 students per year,” said Mr. Byles.

For more information on Junior Achievement and to find out how to volunteer, visit www.jacayman.ky or call 949-4306.

Photo caption: [photo: P Byles Cayman Prep] – Junior Achievement President Mr. Paul Byles visits students at Cayman Prep High School.

[photo: JA Brac] – Teachers and other members of the community attend a recent volunteer recruitment session in Cayman Brac.

About Junior Achievement of the Cayman Islands

Junior Achievement of the Cayman Islands is a not-for-profit association and is funded through the generous contributions from the business community and is governed by a volunteer Board of Directors comprising representatives appointed by Rotary Central, the Chamber of Commerce and elected associate members. JA offers a number of programs aimed at Cayman’s youth. Together these programs impact over 1,200 students each year. These include: the Company Program, JA Career Success and Job Shadow for high school students, Economics for Success for Middle School students and Ourselves for Kindergarten students. Rotary Central introduced Junior Achievement to the Cayman Islands in 1991 and partnered with the Chamber of Commerce on the popular program that focuses on youth.