- Carlington Wilmot/Freelance Photographer
At left, Maths teacher Delano Minott caught in action, while principal, Austin Burrell, states: "We are making progress, though not many people know about it."
Avia Ustanny, Gleaner Writer
ANSWER AS quickly as you can: Where is Penwood High School located?
Odds are on that most readers will not be able to answer this question.
Penwood, located in Olympic Gardens in Kingston, is a school lost in obscurity, until recent years only coming to attention for some incidence of violence or the other.
Considering this, the silence now surrounding its name may be a good thing. But Penwood, among the list of reclassified high schools, has changed both its classification and its nature.
So disciplined has the student body become, that the local police have jumped in on the act, hoping to use the institution to create further change in the community surrounding it.
Principal of the inner-city high school, Austin Burrell, is gleeful, because all that he has dreamed about for his school is on the brink of coming true.
Penwood High School with a student body of approximately 1,000 and a staff complement of 43, is led by this man, who in January 2004 will celebrate 30 years as an educator.
The graduate of both Mico Teachers' College and the University of the West Indies taught at Penwood between 1981 and 1989, when he left to lecture at Excelsior High and Excelsior Community College. He came back to Penwood in the year 2000, however, with a mission to change the school's nature, if not its name.
He told Outlook, "I came back because during my first experience here, I recognised that I could make a difference despite all the limitations." As a young teacher at Penwood in the '80s, he was very involved to the extent where after one year on staff (his third year out of college), he was promoted to senior teacher, Grade 3, the highest level. Four years after that, he was asked to act as vice principal, before he was age 30.
Making progress
Now the man at the helm, "We are making progress," Burrell boasted to Outlook though he admitted, "Not many people know about it."
For the longest while there has been no disciplinary problems at Penwood. "Given where we are coming from and considering that we are a reclassified school, we have made significant strides," Burrell noted.
Up to five years ago, there were no students doing CXC. Now students are all enthusiastic about the programme. The first GSAT group, numbering just over 100, went out last year and although the performance in Maths and English was poor, the principal notes that they performed with excellence in other areas.
In Information Technology, 14 of 21 students were successful. In Clothing and Textiles, six out of seven, in Social Studies, five out of six. Accounts, five out of nine were successful, in Principles of Businesses three out of five, and in auto mechanics 100 per cent passes in the City and Guilds Examinations. "We do particularly well in technical areas," said principal Burrell. "The Math and English are weak, but we are taking steps to improve these areas."
Neat as a pin, and not looking as if she has spent four decades in the classroom, Odette Williams, vice principal, has been the witness to all the most significant changes. "I came here in September 1969, four years after the school opened. When I came here, there was just grade seven to nine, Penwood was a junior secondary school. Then in 1974 it became a new secondary school with up to 11th grade. In 1994 we became a Comprehensive High School. We have changed from where we did just vocational skills to SSC and now we are offering CXC, GCE, NCTVET and City and Guilds. Students used to leave us at Grade nine, now when they leave us some of them are ready for tertiary institutions."
Mrs. Williams said, "I could have left. I was offered jobs at Meadowbrook High and other schools, but the greater need was here." Now she sees her loyalty being rewarded, despite the low odds of success in the inner-city community.
Penwood High School is located on Rhoden Crescent in Olympic Gardens. Over the years, one of the barriers to the development of the school was the location, the principal admits. "Normally, people hear of Olympic Gardens and the connotation of inner-city violence. It was not perception only. Some of the most tragic incidents have occurred here because of the location. People have low self-esteem, low expectations of themselves and anything associated with the community."
Are these attitudes changing?
"I don't know about that," said principal Burrell, "but we are making a concerted effort to change the perceptions of the community." How will he accomplish this?
Burrell is out to re-engineer the image of his school. He is in the middle of implementing a marketing plan for his school and the community alike, a plan based on Olympic Garden's historical significance.
Olympic Gardens was named in recognition of Jamaica's outstanding contribution to world sports following on the 1962 Helsinki Olympics. "The roads in the community are named after the people who gave us the world record," he notes. The high school is named after Dr. George Rhoden, winner of the individual gold medal. There is also McKinley Road, Wint Road, Laing Road, named after Leslie Laing and Collie's Road, named after former Jamaica and West Indies cricketer, Collie Smith.
In addition, the principal claims, some of Jamaica's most outstanding sportsmen have come from Olympic Gardens. Mike McCullum, the only Jamaican to be inducted into the Boxing Hall of Fame, grew up in this community. Ian Goodison, who captained the Jamaica Football team in the only victory in the World Cup finals is also from the community and a past student of the school.
"No other school has as many Grammy winners," Austin Burell also boasts. Junior Reid, Shabba Ranks, Sly Dunbar, Beenie Man (Beenie Man left in Grade 9 to attend Pembroke Hall) are all alumni of Penwood. Other graduates include Half Pint. "Some of these do give their support to the school," he noted in an aside. "Junior Reid has promised some equipment and Shabba has given us his word that he will support us in fund-raising events."
But, working along with the Hunts Bay branch of the Police Force, the school is about to sell this concept of Olympic Gardens as the home of great sportsmen.
The first event will be a road race, which will begin at Penwood on Rhoden Crescent and continue along Olympic Way, Hagley Park Road, Waltham Park Road, Molynes Road, Penwood Road, Spanish Town Road and end up at Hunts Bay where the police station is located.
The school is also planning to have a corner league in the summer of 2004 involving teens from the various districts of Olympic Gardens, including Tower Hill and Waterhouse.
The police and Penwood are also planning to get the input of business places within the industrial belt like Red Stripe, Wray and Nephew, Berger, Tia Maria, HD Hopwood and Tankweld. "There is no other high school in the communities surrounding them," principal Burrell notes.
Normally the location in the inner-city is a negative one. Now Burrell and his team are turning that around.
Superintendent Claude Samuels of the Hunts Bay police told Outlook: "We have to bring back some meaning, some values to community life to inner-city. I do believe that we can start with schools. In the past we have adopted basic schools, now we are going into the high schools. We hope to get involved in the scout movement in creating youth groups and any other positive thing that can be done.
Positive
"We are feeling very positive about Penwood," he added. "Here is a division calling out for help. We want to help."
Both staff and students appear to have also bought into Burell's vision.
Trevor Barrett, Work Programme Co-ordinator and Staff Representative on the board of Penwood High, who has been there for 27 years said, "There have been many challenges at Penwood, but I have seen the negative overcome.
"In the '70s and '80s, those early days, students used to take knives to school. We used to have stabbing incidents. In one case, a boy was rushed to hospital, in another, a gun was taken from a student. We have not had that of late. We have spoken to them, motivated them, with the leadership of Mr Burrell, we have tightened up, we have held them and reined them in. Violence is behind us, we hope."
Principal Burrell says, "I have not had to speak to students about weapons. For you to be having that at Penwood is a major achievement. Students are also expressing pride in the school. We see it in their deportment. We hear it in what they say."
Sashoy Hall, 17-year-old Grade 11 student who lives in Olympic Gardens, hopes that on graduation she will be able to attend Mico and the University of the West Indies on her way to becoming a geologist. She told Outlook, "The teachers at Penwood are excellent. There are glitches, but we just need to remain focussed."
Rhamone Messardo from Seaward Drive, another 11th grader business student, said "Things are changing at Penwood. There were some children who were giving trouble. We are hoping to continue improving so that those who want to learn can learn." He says his Mathematics and Information Technology teachers are the best.
Their principal is full of hope. He is a general whose aim it is to win a war against violence, against hopelessness, against failure, and the inner-city belief that nothing good can be achieved by the poor.
"Good can come out of Nazareth," Outlook was told by Ruby McIntosh, a 66-year-old retired newspaper vendor and a resident of Rhoden Crescent, who has been watching students, including six of her seven children, go in and out the gates of Penwood for 34 years:
"I see where the Teacher (Principal Burrell) is trying his best. They have the children under good manners. They have built a wall, new gates.
"There are a lot of changes. There is only the children to co-operate now."
