SUNDAY 6 MAY, 2018 – UWI TODAY
3
EDITORIAL TEAM
CAMPUS PRINCIPAL
Professor Brian Copeland
DIRECTOR OF MARKETING AND COMMUNICATIONS
Dr Dawn-Marie De Four-Gill
EDITOR
Vaneisa Baksh • email:
CONTACT US
The UWI Marketing and Communications Office
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FROM THE PRINCIPAL
Managing the Challenges of Our Time
On April 27
, our Chancellor,
Mr. Robert Bermudez, presided
over his first University Council
Meeting as Chairman. As he
addressed the issue of the
University’s challenges in the
current economic times, he gave
a timely reassurance that had
particular resonance for me. He
reminded representatives of the
regional governments of The
UWI contributing countries as
well as The UWI faculty, staff, and student representation
that, while the ‘University has faced many serious challenges
in its 70 years, each event has seen it triumph over adversity.’
So it is with a certain sense of pride that that I invite you
to peruse this edition of UWI TODAY where you will see the
ample proof of howwell we – as a University and, particularly,
as a Campus – have triumphed as a development tool for
peoples of the Caribbean.
The St. Augustine Campus, like the other three Campuses
of this regional university, has had to make critical shifts
in focus as it navigates a prolonged testing season at an
institutional level. Our vision for creating a culture of
innovation and entrepreneurship is a major response to the
changing mandate for education, declining economies, and
the need for strategic but practical approaches to revitalizing
the Caribbean.
Eleanor “Nell”Watson, writer, engineer and entrepreneur,
was our guest speaker at a Distinguished Open Lecture on
Artificial Intelligence and Education. Some may fear the
burgeoning use of artificial intelligence in all elements of
our lives with the potential loss of our very humanity; others
may exalt it in recognition of the boundless possibilities that
AI promises. Regardless, the fact remains that we need to
prepare our students to take advantage of it in the interests of
this region’s sustained development. As Nell Watson said in
her lecture, “We need to be producing chefs not cooks.” This
Campus’ avowed innovation agenda is absolutely in sync with
this concept. It sets out that every level in our education system
must incorporate that culture of innovationmentioned earlier
so that we create, not simply follow, the recipe of the status
quo in an independence of thought and mind.
Starring on our cover is the National Herbarium of
Trinidad and Tobago, perhaps the country’s oldest research
institute, as it marks its 200th anniversary in 2018.The National
Herbarium maintains an archival collection of Trinidad
and Tobago’s indigenous and exotic plants with the earliest
specimens dating from1842. This amazing collection numbers
more than 50,000 specimens and is continuously expanding.
In a significant community outreach initiative, the
National Herbarium will join with Hillview College and the
Biodiversity Society at The UWI to plant 200 trees in a re-
afforestation project in the hillside of Tunapuna. I urge you to
pay a visit to the National Herbarium and learn more about
the immense wealth of our natural history and the dedicated
work of the team there.
I know that if we in science and technology in Trinidad
and Tobago and the Caribbean are to move beyond known
frontiers while keeping a moral centre, then we must look
for the voice of conscience and reason in our writers, artists,
creatives. Literature has long shaped civilisations, raised up
and brought down political systems, and prodded us to think,
often uncomfortably, beyond self-interest. Professor Elizabeth
Walcott-Hackshaw, in her professorial inaugural lecture, calls
the Caribbean ‘a location of trauma’ where, two hundred years
later, the legacies of colonialism and slavery are present in our
very DNA and still ‘haunt’ us. How do we re-invent ourselves?
We can only do so by using our inherent survival mechanisms
to leapfrog over obstacles in our way even as we stay rooted
in the strength of who we are. We need the philosophers and
thinkers to keep us grounded.
It was in recognition of these truths that The UWI
partnered in the just concluded eighth NGC Bocas Lit Fest.
This literary festival once again celebrated words and ideas
in their various forms, among them, ‘Cinelit’. For the second
year running, UWI’s Department of Modern Languages and
Linguistics hosted, free of charge, this innovative hybrid of
film and literature on the St. Augustine Campus. Visitors
were treated to 31 films from more than 22 countries,
including 17 in Spanish and Portuguese. Films ranged from
award-winning feature films based on the work of some of
Latin America’s greatest writers, ground-breaking work by
Anglophone filmmakers, to children’s animations and stirring
documentaries about contemporary life. If you missed it this
year, remember to put it on your calendar for 2019!
Even as the blooming of the Poui on our Campus delights
the eye, it also reminds students that examinations are upon
them and that the end of our 2017-2018 academic year is
approaching. It may even mean that their period of study at
The UWI is at an end – for the moment – and that they will
be joining the ranks of over 100,000 alumni, located in every
sphere of endeavour across the Caribbean and the world.
There will always be challenges to be faced. In so doing, we
may not always meet immediate success. Yet, we always gain
in the knowledge of going the distance and giving it our best
shot. Then, like tempered steel, we rise stronger than before.
We ARE UWI.
PROFESSOR BRIAN COPELAND
Pro Vice-Chancellor and Campus Principal
Colin Laird,
one of the country’s outstanding
architects, died at the age of 93 in early April. Mr,
Laird was the designer of some of our most iconic
national buildings – Queen’s Hall, the Jean Pierre
Complex and National Stadium, the Brian Lara
Promenade, and the National Library.
Born in England in 1924, Mr Laird made
Trinidad and Tobago his home and in return was
claimed by the Republic as one of its own. He
was presented with the Chaconia Gold medal in
2001, and was named one of the country’s 50 Icons
during the 50th anniversary of independence
celebrations in 2013.
The UWI owns the Colin Laird Architectural
collection which records a substantial amount
of the work he did during the period between
1946 and 2008. The collection includes sketches,
designs, photographs and reports fromhis various
projects throughout the Caribbean. In 2014, The
Alma Jordan Library, where the collection is
housed, held a mini exhibition of his work. The
accompanying photo shows one of the designs for
Queen’s Hall in 1956. He was awarded first place
in that competition.
Librarian at the West Indiana Collection,
Lorraine Nero said that Laird had a passion for
maps and as a result accumulated an impressive
map collection. “In 2009 we acquired that
collection which has been labelled as the
Caribbean Charts and Engraving collection, and
includes maps from 1555-1818.”
COLIN LAIRD
COLLECTION AT
ALMA JORDAN
LIBRARY
The UWI owns the Colin
Laird Architectural collection
which records a substantial
amount of the work he did
during the period between
1946 and 2008.
