‘Best birthday gift’

EDWIN ALLEN High School girls team’s victory in the ISSA/GraceKennedy Boys and Girls’ Athletics Championships on Saturday has been declared the ‘best birthday gift’ for the institution celebrating its 60th anniversary.

The Frankfield, Clarendon-based school dethroned defending champions Hydel High, 335.5-326 points, to reclaim the championship.

Yesterday, the school’s compound was the site of a jubilant celebration as students, staff and the extended school community congregated to honour the team that had brought them glory once more.

With horns blaring, music blasting through speakers, and people occasionally breaking out into dance, the atmosphere was set for the winning team to make their entrance.

After the disappointment of last year’s defeat, Principal Jermaine Harris congratulated the team on fulfilling their promise to bring back the trophy and sealing their 10th title.

“Bringing in the title is the best birthday present that we could ever imagine as a school and the girls would have promised us that as a school and they have delivered. So I know that as a school and the stakeholder groups including the past students, they are overjoyed,” he said.

The principal noted that the team, hailed as the favourite going into the competition, worked tirelessly and overtime to achieve this feat.

Their coach, Michael Dyke, also shared similar sentiments. He told The Gleaner that after winning back-to-back titles, the team had become complacent.

However, placing second in 2023 shocked them into exercising more discipline.

“The fact that we lost the championship last year, we came back and quickly went back to the drawing board and we saw that we are going to look at what caused the defeat, fix that and start our way forward, and that’s what we did,” he said. “They became a lot more disciplined this year knowing that they cannot afford to lose another year.”

KUDOS TO SUPPORT TEAM

And praising the “comprehensive” track and field programme at the institution, Dyke shared that Edwin Allen continues to thrive because of the enormous support it receives from its past students, noting that there is even a track and field foundation set up by the school’s former athletes.

“Overall, parents are very supportive, the programme is the life of Edwin Allen so principal, vice principal, the staff ... everybody support the programme in order to enable us to do the job,” he said.

But the value of the programme extends beyond the school gates to the Frankfield community, Principal Harris stated.

According to him, the institution’s consistent dominance at the championships also breathes life into the community which he said had regressed over the years.

“The heartbeat of Frankfield is Edwin Allen. If you take out Edwin Allen out of Frankfield, Frankfield is literally dead. In terms of what we are achieving as a school it sort of splinters throughout the community, and persons have that sort of a hope, looking forward to our school doing well so that it can replicate throughout the community,” he said.

It is his desire for the school’s illustrious track and field programme to serve as a catalyst for development in Frankfield.

“I hope that the fact that Edwin Allen is doing well, the political directorate, and the business community will work with us to see how we can collaborate to now improve the overall development of the community,” he said.

The school’s boys team in the meantime placed 10th. Its captain, Joshua St Jean, said the team’s performance was in honour of late teacher Kerry Ann ‘Macky’ Wright McCarthy, who died suddenly on February 24.

The 100-metre runner said Wright McCarthy, who had taught at the institution for more than 20 years, and was head of the department, was the biggest fan of the boys track and field team.

“She was one of our biggest supporters, always encouraging every time we go to track meets and so forth, she always came to give us encouraging words. One of her last encouraging words was the Gibson Relays, she told us to go out and do our best,” he said.

Meanwhile, Harris’ intent is to channel some of the attention that the school’s track and field programme is getting into acquiring more support for its academic endeavours.

“We will just use this as an opportunity to continue to market the school as a holistic school and to see if we can get other past students and other stakeholders to come on board to help us with our academic programme,” he said of the institution where approximately 2,200 students attend.

“It costs a lot to maintain a strong sports programme, but we need a lot of resources to improve academics,” he added.

sashana.small@gleanerjm.com