Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar has reaffirmed her longstanding commitment to education, community upliftment, and equal opportunity, as she distributed school supplies to children across her Siparia constituency.
Speaking at her annual Back to School Initiative on Tuesday, she revealed that during the July–August vacation, many families reached out to her office seeking help in preparing their children for the new academic year. Responding to these requests, her constituency office mobilised resources to ensure that more than 2,000 students will receive aid: school bags, essential stationery, and book vouchers.
“In addition to those 2,000 children that we have worked together to help, our Minister of Education, through the Ministry of Education, will be assisting 20,000 children with book grants. When we got into office, there was no provision in terms of money for book grants for children this year and one of the first things we did, we had something called a mid-term review. We had to find money and we sat together, we cut out some things that we felt were not essential because we believed that your welfare, the students, the children, that your welfare should be our priority. And so we found $20 million to put towards that 20,000 students in the whole of Trinidad and Tobago for book grants.”
The Prime Minister described the initiative as a deeply personal mission, rooted in her own upbringing in Siparia. She shared her own journey from humble beginnings, recalling how a bursary she earned as a top-performing student made a difference in her life.
“For my family, that was not just an award for us, it was a lifeline. The bursary allowed my parents to buy my books, easing a burden that was weighing very heavily on their shoulders. Without that bursary, I don’t know how they would have managed and that bursary inspired me to work even harder in secondary school.”
She emphasised that education was her way out of poverty and continues to be the most powerful tool for social and economic advancement.
Reaffirming her government’s commitment to equitable education, Prime Minister Persad-Bissessar highlighted the reintroduction of the laptop distribution programme for all Form One students starting this school year.
“That is why we have reintroduced the distribution of laptops to every Form One student in this new school year. That will be happening. They say books open the mind but technology opens the world. That is why the laptops are so important.”