Speech for SBCS 25th Anniversary, Monday, February 13th, 2012-02-12
The great Greek Philosopher Socrates once observed, “An unexamined life is not worth living.” This principle applies to individuals and organisations alike and it has been our North Star over the past 25 years. What does this mean - “The unexamined life is not worth living." Socrates said that at his trial for heresy. He was on trial for encouraging his students to challenge the accepted beliefs of the time and think for themselves. The sentence was death but Socrates had the option of suggesting an alternative punishment. He could have chosen life in prison or exile, and would likely have avoided death. But Socrates believed that these alternatives would rob him of the only thing that made life useful: Examining the world around him and discussing how to make the world a better place. Without his "examined life" there was no point in living “ A life without purpose is a wasted life, be it for an individual or for an organization.
Like Socrates I believe that helping to prepare individuals to lead
productive or examined lives is one of the noblest and useful ways to live this life, and I
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Speech for SBCS 25th Anniversary, Monday, February 13th, 2012-02-12
am daily humbled by the incredible opportunity that the universe has presented to us. How did this journey begin? Today I would like to examine the life of SBCS, not its entire life but more its climacterics, by taking us all back in time to 1986, the year of the idea for SBCS, when that single footstep was made that has culminated in today’s event . Truly a journey of a thousand miles and more begins with a single footstep. 1986: In August 1986 I returned to Trinidad from Canada to house sit for my parents who were just about to leave on a tour to India, I had every intention of returning to Canada in October to complete my CMA final year studies, I had previously completed my 1st degree in IT and Management earlier that year. While in Trinidad I decided to apply for a part time lecturing position at a school in POS, Caribbean College of Commerce on Pembroke Street and later at another School. I was amazed at the demand, there was a real thirst for IT knowledge and the students were eager and willing. Though the economy was in a slump and getting worse daily, I found that many people were very interested in education. When I initially visited the school in POS I was impressed with their lab, which was fully outfitted with an IBM 34/36 state of the art minicomputer with terminals, within 2 months it was all gone and my pay check was returned by the bank with the stamp, insufficient funds. That’s when I said to my MOM and DAD, that the guy who owned this facility was truly insane. He had lots of students but could not care less about delivering to them a decent service far less a great service. My DAD said to me why don’t you open a similar
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Speech for SBCS 25th Anniversary, Monday, February 13th, 2012-02-12
institute, ,seeing that you know so much , and there my friends is how I got the idea, through my DAD. So we need to thank Mr. Maraj senior for the SBCS idea. I said to him, that’s crazy, I could not possibly do this, but after a while I started thinking maybe I could, my dad had a building in San Juan at #3 Santa Cruz old , which had apartments upstairs and downstairs a very large empty space that formerly housed a company called Mendez engraving. Of course this was not POS or St. Augustine and I had little or no funds, but I decided that even though it would be a great challenge to open a school of this type in San Juan, and worse yet in the back of San Juan and three houses away from the cemetery to boot, that I would give it a try. Computers, that was the next challenge, I attempted to find out from NCB if they were willing to sell the seized equipment from the school in POS, however, I could not afford the amount they requested. So I decided that I would start with PCs and that’s what I did, my dad lent me the money to purchase 7 IBM PCs from IBM Trinidad and software from a company on Edward street named Computer land. This was one of those connect the dots moments, not being able to purchase the minicomputer was in fact a blessing in disguise, though a disappointment at that time. The market was rapidly moving to PCs and in time tremendous opportunities would be created by this phenomenon. The first SBCS was a clean and simple space, the interior walls were made mainly of ply, the ACs were used ones, sourced from a fire sale of assets from the then defunct Kirpilani enterprise. I recall at this time my Dad having the wonderful idea to use sheets of white laminate to create local whiteboards, at that time we could not afford to buy the authentic item. I think we created this product, which led to many persons copying our lead. What I recall best at this time was the naming of the school, I had hired a sign Office of the Executive Director | Date Released:02/12/12
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Speech for SBCS 25th Anniversary, Monday, February 13th, 2012-02-12
painter from San Juan and I told him the name that I wanted painted: Centre for Management and Information systems, CFMIS, he dutifully followed my instructions and after completing the task climbed down from his ladder and said to me, “ Boss, what you opening here”, I knew then and there that I had chosen the wrong name, if this ordinary guy could not understand that he was painting a sign for a school then something was wrong. That’s when I decided that I would change the name to: School of Business and Computer Science (SBCS), this he understood except for the Computer science part. SBCS commenced operations on Friday, February 13th, 1987, with one full time member of staff and 1 part time assistant (my dad) , of course we had no students, so I decided to create short courses in IT, teaching and training the average person on the practical use of DOS, WordStar, Lotus, DBASE, General Accounting and Programming. One problem, except for programming I had not a clue about the other courses, (only theoretical knowledge) so while I advertised these short courses, I spent
my days
learning the software (useful things that universities don’t teach you). I spent Sundays painting the classrooms, cleaning floors and generally doing work geared toward uplifting the general environment; remember it used to be factory. From day one it was a success, by my measure, for 350 dollars one could do a 3 month short course and use actual computers, I enjoyed it , it was hard work but fun, as I really enjoyed seeing the faces of students light up after having learnt to type, edit and print a document etc. Having spent around 4 months working at another school where accounting and business courses were taught I had already decided that I would
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Speech for SBCS 25th Anniversary, Monday, February 13th, 2012-02-12
teach not just IT, but also business courses, hence the name. Because of my unique background I was perfectly suited to this enterprise as I had studied at university in great depth: Accounting, IT, programming, Economics, Management, Digital logic, auditing, marketing, finance, mathematics and statistics etc. what this meant is that I could teach these courses, consequently, I was able to quickly add to our portfolio of programmes: Accountancy (ACCA and AAT) Management (ABE) IT (IDPM and ACP) Marketing (CIM) The years 1987-1990 saw much growth and the addition of staff, Earl jack , he started off as a student in a short course then became an assistant to me in the lab and then full time member of staff, there were others later Megan , Catherine and part time lecturers like Rosemarie Sinanan, Garfield Winston etc. Earl was a tremendous assistance during this nascent period (early years). Our current IT manager, Hayden Hernandez was also a short course student during this period and subsequently on one of our longer programmes, the IDPM programme. I am delighted that they are both here today. Later on I met Frank Suban, he also did a short course in Pascal programming and the late Ricky Geeban and so many more fantastic persons who later worked with us. I met them all in San Juan. While things were progressing well in San Juan, I realised at an early stage that we were fast outgrowing our space and soon would need to move to a more convenient Office of the Executive Director | Date Released:02/12/12
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Speech for SBCS 25th Anniversary, Monday, February 13th, 2012-02-12
and larger location, once again serendipity stepped in. Each day going to work I would observe this property( Sagan drive) whilst in my car at the traffic lights; in those days it was a used car sales place, BOBAN’s; Often I say to my Mom and Dad that this would be the most ideal location for SBCS . Of course I had little money and consequently not the proverbial snow ball’s chance in hell of obtaining this property, but the universe works in mysterious ways and in earlier 1989 I was informed that this property was being placed for sale via sealed bids. I placed a bid with great trepidation as I had no idea how I would raise the funds, if my bid was selected, lucky for me the sale was withdrawn. I was quite disappointed, and decided that I would continue to focus on SBCS San Juan and forget this dream for the time. Lo and behold in late 1989 the property once gain was being advertised for sale, this time via bid auction, the auctioneer AM Querino, when I arrived at the auction house there was one more person, I won the auction at a price that was significantly lower, by more than 200 k dollars than the selling price in 1989 early. I was overjoyed. I recall AM Querino saying to me that the he had sold Bolan Amar his first property and he wished me similar success! Now I had another problem I had no money to build a building and I was against using the old house that was on the property. Many years earlier my Dad had used PRES T CON to build the building that housed the present school in San Juan and I decided to approach them to do the concrete frame for a 3 storey building, when I presented by request to the then CEO, the request, to allow me to pay them in 2 instalments, he said , but you barely have enough money to pay us a down payment, how are you going to be able to finish, and suppose you are unable to pay, we will not be able to remove our concrete columns and double Ts. I convinced him that it was Office of the Executive Director | Date Released:02/12/12
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Speech for SBCS 25th Anniversary, Monday, February 13th, 2012-02-12
possible, due in no small measure to the kindness of one of the engineers Bruce wood, who for no real reason thought I could walk the talk. The CEO said to me after that I was the only person that had had ever extended credit to. A combination of my audacity, my dad’s good name and Bruce wood, it was Bruce who had recommended that I speak to the CEO. Bruce tragically died in a freak accident a few years ago at a project site, however, I will never forget his kindness, and he was man possessed of a good soul. In the middle of our building project came the attempted coup, I would spend nights in the unfinished building that is now Course Administration (downstairs) machine grinding terrazzo tiles ,and inhaling copious amounts of CO2 that got many ill, but not me. In the end we were right on schedule, we opened SBCS in October 1990 for classes by transferring over a weekend everything from SBCS San Juan. I recall seeing Hayden atop a truck with all our possessions from SBCS San Juan, and thinking to myself what would Mrs. Hernandez think if she saw this. I remember Frank Suban, visiting and expressing some disbelief that we would be able to open in October, but we did it, albeit without AC; with dirt car park and many unfinished spaces, but we had students and lecturers. From 1990 onwards to now we have stayed true to our vision and mission, continuous development and improvement, in fact some weeks we would literally the empty the school of all its furniture and carry out construction type works over the weekend or on Fridays and be ready for the next or following Saturday without anyone on the outside ever knowing what we were doing. In those days we would even build our own furniture, and I would make regular trips to the beet ham landfill to with
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Speech for SBCS 25th Anniversary, Monday, February 13th, 2012-02-12
loads of rubble. I had sold my car to purchase a van in order to have a more useful vehicle as well as raise funds. In December 1991 I got married, and many of you may not know this and others may not believe it, however myself and Vijaya (Mrs. Maraj) lived in a studio apartment of the second floor of the main building. Later we moved to a full apartment in the N block, where our IT development team and part of our library is now housed. We lived there very happily for about 4 years, in fact our first son Pravin spent his first birthday here at SBCS. Mrs. Maraj actually taught a math course in the early days before taking over the bookstore which eventually blossomed into Corporate Education Centre (CEC), there would be no SBCS at least in the form it is without her and she has and continues to be my light in both bright and dark times. Years ago I said in a speech that I am happy to leave home everyday to come to SBCS, and I am happy to leave SBCS everyday to return home, I exist in two heavens. Corville, Lyndon, Simon, Richard, and later Jearlean all played invaluable roles in our development during this period 1990-2003, in the case of the guys they were maintenance, security and everything else rolled up into one. During this period SBCS expanded, first by adding a second floor, then the N block, then a third floor, then the acquisition of 54 Sagan drive, each year there was something different. Who can forget the weekly electrical issues that we faced every Saturday during this time when the main breaker would trip around 11:30 a.m every Saturday due to electrical overload, or the day that the cable bringing electricity to the building burnt and fell on a student’s car or the times when the meter would start smoking, once catching a fire. Exciting and perilous times, in those days I would be teaching with much apprehension on Saturday as the 11:30 time approached, and on the dot the lights would flicker and the breaker
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Speech for SBCS 25th Anniversary, Monday, February 13th, 2012-02-12
would trip. It took us years to resolve this problem. Mrs. Maraj, myself and Pravin moved from our SBCS apartment in 1996 when we started construction of the U block and that’s when I met Mr. Mahabir and Mr. Bernard and later Mr. Sunil and the shape and form of the SBCS began to changed but not its vision nor mission. Over the years it has been a wonderful journey full of excitement, hard work, sacrifices, and challenges and of great people. I have been truly blessed to meet over the past 25 years some of the finest people of our nation, men and women who have and continue to share my dream that through education and great teaching we can make a difference. And we have doing this wonderfully for now 25 years and we will continue come what may for many more years. During the period 2003-2008, we built campuses in POS 2003, San Fernando 2006 and Trincity 2008, all imbued with the same spirit that pervades and permeates SBCS Champs Fleurs, excellent service for all . From 2008 to present day we have continued to focus on improving our campuses and resources so as to provide our students and staff with an ever improving learning and working environment. And now there is one more item that I wish to discuss and that is our current issue with the government Our current challenge might appear to those unacquainted with myself or the SBCS culture as monumental, however it is not, rather it is but one more obstacle one more test that has been placed in our path in order to make us stronger and better. At times like this I recall the poem INVICTUS: by William Earnest Henley
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Speech for SBCS 25th Anniversary, Monday, February 13th, 2012-02-12
Invictus Out of the night that covers me, Black as the Pit from pole to pole, I thank whatever gods may be For my unconquerable soul.
In the fell clutch of circumstance I have not winced nor cried aloud. Under the bludgeoning of chance My head is bloody, but unbowed.
Beyond this place of wrath and tears Looms but the Horror of the shade, And yet the menace of the years Finds, and shall find, me unafraid.
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Speech for SBCS 25th Anniversary, Monday, February 13th, 2012-02-12
It matters not how strait the gate, How charged with punishments the scroll. I am the master of my fate: I am the captain of my soul. The reality is that we could have easily bowed to the pressures exerted upon us by the state , submitted to their demands, and avoided all this unpleasantness, however, as I stated in my letter to staff, cowardice is not in my DNA and I will not let us be bullied by any one. Yes, the phrase used by the reporter “ alleged fraud” is hard to stomach, however, this is the world we live in , it’s always easier to tear down than it’s to build, it’s always easier to defame than to praise. I wish the reporter well and trust that in time she will evolve. People tend to forget that the mighty Goliath was felled by David and his sling, so let not your hearts be troubled by today’s challenges, we did not reach this place and time by accident and we will never submit to oppression and vindictiveness. Remember no matter what, Truth will always overcome untruth just as light removes darkness. Our greatest weapon in this battle is to continue to live true to our Corporate Mantra, no matter what we must never allow our service to our students to diminish, Stay strong and stay focused
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Speech for SBCS 25th Anniversary, Monday, February 13th, 2012-02-12
Remember: At SBCS (Ltd.) we promise to deliver an excellent service At a profit, if we can; At a loss, if we must; But always excellence! To all members of the SBCS team, past and present, those here and those not here, I wish to convey my sincere thanks for your invaluable support. You are the life force of SBCS; the most amazing physical educational facilities are but empty shells without dedicated teachers and administrators, without people with good hearts and minds, who in turn will attract students with the right attitude and work ethic. There are many who think that they can effectively compete with us by building bigger buildings, in time they will realise that our real competitive advantage is not our buildings but our people, and this they will never obtain in this lifetime. One life changed can make difference , on the cover of our 25th anniversary magazine is a curve that represents the butterfly effect, what it hopes to show is that a single event can have untold repercussions in the future, we don’t know what our students will become or accomplish in the future, however, what we do know is that if we deliver to them a great experience and show them by our every action that this place can be made better for all then who knows what impact they will have in the future. Yes, we are making a difference and the future is bright, even when it appears as if evil is stronger, it never is and never will be , goodness and kindness always wins out in the end, as Rabindranath Tagore says :
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Speech for SBCS 25th Anniversary, Monday, February 13th, 2012-02-12
Faith is the bird that feels the light and sings when the dawn is still dark. Rabindranath Tagore (1861 - 1941) To my parents, my wife Vijaya, my children Pravin, Sajeev and Vandita, thank you for your love and support. To the wonderful people of SBCS thank you. I thank you for your kind attention, and Happy 25th Anniversary!
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