Digicel Touches Thousands Through Back-to-School Outreach Programme

As many ushered in the new academic year, Digicel continued its corporate goodwill in St. Lucia through its Back to School Outreach Programme.

Last week, Team Digicel concluded this programme with intense island-wide school supplies deliveries to over 40 schools throughout St. Lucia to socio-economically-challenged communities and underprivileged students within schools.

As part of this annual drive, Digicel staff and volunteers further delivered thousands of school supplies, including back packs, notebooks, lunch bags, pencil cases and exercise books, to various schools.
Beneficiary schools in the northern zone included Gros Islet Primary, Monchy Combined, La Guerre Combined, Boguis Combined, Fond Assau Combined, Babonneau Infant, Marchand Combined, Dame Pearlette, Balata Combined as well as the special needs institutions Donator and Lady Gordon Opportunity Centre.

The team also traversed the east coast with deliveries to Bexon Primary, Aux Lyons Combined, La Ressource Combined, Dennery Primary and Micoud Primary before heading south to Pierrot Combined, Grace Combined, Augier Combined and the Vieux-Fort Special Education.

The following day, the team commenced at the Banse Combined School before proceeding to the Laborie Boys Primary School. Upon arrival, Principal of the Laborie Boys Primary School, Mr. Adrian Darcheville, was delighted as Team Digicel made their way onto the school compound with the donations and expressed his gratitude by saying “Wow! You guys arrived just in time because I was just about getting ready to head to Vieux-Fort to get some exercise books in aid of those students who are in need. So I must say I am indeed grateful.”

Other schools receiving supplies were Piaye Combined, Saltibus Combined, Roblot Combined, River Doree Anglican Primary, Dugard Combined, Reunion Combined, Les Estangs Combined, Soufriere Infant, Soufriere Special Needs, Bouton Combined, Millet Infant, Anse la Raye Infant, Roseau Combined and Canaries Infant as well as the Crisis Centre and religious organizations.

Digicel also took a different approach to this year’s back-to-school programme with the incorporation of a complimentary breakfast initiative for students. In collaboration with Pinehill, Digicel was able to provide a free breakfast for the opening of the new school year in both the north and south of the island to students as they made their way to school. All children attired in school uniform were provided with a nourishing meal to ensure they got the perfect start to their day along with providing free back-to-school bus rides to assist parents with transportation fees.

“At Digicel we believe in fostering holistic development of young people and very critical to that developmental process is education. Our Back-to-School Outreach programme has over the years helped transform families, schools, communities and, of course, the lives of those who directly benefitted. From the scholarships disbursements, to our school feeding initiative, free back to school bus rides, recognition of the island’s top Common Entrance achiever right up to our school deliveries, we undoubtedly saw the impact this programme continues to have. The level of gratitude expressed by teachers, parents and students themselves tells of how timely the donations have all been. Principals especially continuously lamented the number of students who stayed away from school as a result of not having school supplies. Our hope is that through this transformative education journey that we can help students transcend to higher levels in all aspects of their lives,” explained Louise Victor, Marketing and Communications Executive at Digicel.

The general public also took advantage of Digicel’s Back-to-School commercial offer for 2016, ‘Bring the Beat for Back to School”, with eight lucky customers each benefitting from a five hundred dollar Back to School cash prize, with an additional 200 winning big in-store with backpacks loaded with school supplies. The backpacks all included exercise books, umbrellas, pencils, pens, pencil cases and lunch bags.