Society would have been different had the Church schools been allowed to continue

Dear Editor,
The Marian Academy, thank God, has endured ten challenging years in our society and education system. I thank God because these are not easy times that we’re living in. And I can rest assured that this lone Catholic school in our country has been disseminating quality education for the past ten years.  

The Roman Catholic Church has a rich history of education in Guyana — so I’ve heard. The high standards, the achievements and scholarship have been the mainstay of Catholic education in Guyana prior to the government’s ownership of all schools. I read somewhere that Guyana’s education system was described as the ‘jewel of the Caribbean’ in the ’60s. So we had the top- notch education system in the region! 

Views concerning the government’s take-over of all private schools in the ’70s have been mixed over the past years. But I am convinced that our society, today, would have been a different one had there been a continuation of Church schools in the system.

Well, there’s always a distant hope out there — hope as was expressed in the words of Bishop Francis Alleyne at a special Mass to coincide with the 10th anniversary of Marian some time ago: “Imagine what else could be possible.”

Yours faithfully, 
Leon Jameson Suseran