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UWI TODAY
– SUNDAY 9 OCTOBER, 2016
campus news
The UWI St. Augustine hosted
its annual Matriculation
and Welcome Ceremony to welcome all first year students
in September. The event marked Pro Vice-Chancellor
and Campus Principal Professor Brian Copeland’s first
Matriculation Ceremony in his new capacity following
his July 1 appointment. This year’s undergraduate student
intake total approximately 3,500 students, consistent with
the intake figures of the last academic year.
In his address, the Campus Principal urged students to
make their contribution to society by working to change this
state of economic affairs. “Do as your counterparts in other
lands have done and apply those creative and innovative
talents and skills to devise products, processes, systems and
methods that the world has never seen before. Move then to
create your own companies, medium or small, to sell these
new entities or, as an employee of an already established
firm, to improve the value of its existing products, processes,
systems and methods so as to improve its international
competitiveness. You need to start thinking about this as of
now. Fulfil your mandate as future leaders of the Caribbean”.
In addition to the principal’s address, the ceremony
is marked by the symbolic signing of the Matriculation
Register by a student of the incoming cohort, the recital of
the Academic Vow led by President of the Guild of Students
–Makesi Peters and the official welcome by Vice-Chancellor,
Professor Sir Hilary Beckles. In his remarks, which included
the official recognition of new students as members of the
academic community of the region’s premiere university,
Vice-Chancellor Sir Hilary Beckles said, “Around the world
people have marvelled at how we have been able to build a
first class university with limited financial resources...This
tradition of excellence that we have created over the past 68
years has been entrusted to you”.
This year, the Matriculation Register was signed by
UWI welcomes 3,500 new undergrads in
14
th Matriculation Ceremony
Asmita Nankissoon, a first-year student in the Bachelor
of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery (MBBS) programme
in the Faculty of Medical Sciences. Nankissoon, a former
student of the St. Augustine Girls High School, was
recognised for obtaining the highest grade in CSEC Physics
and CAPE Biology Unit 1 at her high school, as well as for
her cultural contribution and dance. As is the tradition,
she was selected for demonstrating the key attributes of the
distinctive The UWI graduate.
A Matriculation Ceremony is the occasion where
new students are formally recognised as members of the
university community. In 2002, after a 30-year hiatus, the
Matriculation andWelcome Ceremony was reinstated atThe
UWI St. Augustine Campus under then Campus Principal
Dr Bhoendradatt Tewarie. Now, a mainstay on the campus’
calendar, 2016 commemorates the 14th staging of the event
which always takes place at the start of the academic year.
PhotoS: Aneel Karim
