Saint Catherine’s Academy is fundraising for a million dollar
multi purpose building. The scale of the project is too great for funds to come
from bake sales or fairs, so that’s why the school is opening up with
a public fund raising drive. As they celebrated the schools 123rd anniversary
– they said it’s time to make a new kind of history.
Jacqueline Godwin Reporting,
This is what St. Catherine Academy’s multi purpose building will look
like following its completion in the very near future. This morning the billboard
was unveiled and the ground was blessed on which the million dollars plus structure
will be constructed.
Rose Rivera, Sister of Mercy
“As you know we are desperate. We cannot take anymore students because
we have we are at capacity. We now have two buildings in the yard that are just 
little huts that we have two extra classes in there. It is really not appropriate.
We have no auditorium, we have no cafeteria, we don’t really have a decent
library and everything – we need expansion. It has grown in members but
buildings wise it hasn’t grown. I think the Science Building was the last
building to go up and that was built in the 70s.”
The special occasion was well attended by not only the principal, teachers
and SCA’s five hundred young women but past graduates from the classes
of 1944 to present. Even Baby Hannah, seen here in her mother’s arm hopefully
one day will keep the SCA tradition alive in her family. The celebration also
marked the arrival of the Sisters of Mercy that occurred on this day January
twentieth, 1883. It was re-enacted in a presentation by the SCA students themselves.
Salome Tillett, Principal
“The sisters arrived January 20th and they started school January
22nd so they had one day of rest. By the second day they had already opened 
school for students and I always reflect when I think back at what the Sisters
who came, the sacrifice they made because they never went back to their families.
They came from New Orleans and they died here in Belize. So they gave their
life to start what we have inherited, the legacy that is nursing and education,
mostly education in Belize.
And their work has not only been here at the high school but also Mercy
Clinic, Mercy Kitchen, Muffles High School, Muffles Junior College and the various
Ministries that the sisters started in Belize City, in Toledo, in Belmopan,
and all the places that they went to reach out to women and to empower the women
of Belize.”
Rose Rivera,
“We really got to thank the Jesuits. They were teaching boys and they
saw the need to educate girls and they were relentless in approaching the Sisters
of Mercy in Louisiana and to send sisters here so that they could educate the
women of Belize. We got to thank them for doing that.”
The Sisters of Mercy Congregation was founded in 1831 by an Irish woman Catherine
McCauley who once stated the tender Mercy of God has given us one another. And
no more is that spirit of giving needed now to make one of SCA’s dream
a reality. Two years after the planning and designing of the high school’s
multi purpose building the work now intensifies to raise the money it will take
to build it.
Salome Tillett,
“Our fundraising has actually been ongoing for about three years now.
We have had triathlons. We’ve had actually four triathlons with the specific
purpose of aiding our building. We’ve also been moving out to our alumnae
and asking them for help and we believe it is time for us to start with whatever
we have. We are way below what we need but we will begin and we hope that the
goodwill which the community has for the school, the faith that the public has
in the education that our young women have, and the service that the women who
came through SCA have offered to Belize will be an encouragement to the general
public and in particular to our alumnae to support the school and that we need
them.”
Rose Rivera,
“I retired four years ago and devoted my entirely to the Alumnae Association
and to see that this dream becomes a reality.”
It is expected that once the multipurpose building is constructed the enrolment
of just a little over five hundred students will increase. Reporting for 7News
Jacqueline Godwin.
If you would like to make a pledge towards the SCA Multi Purpose Building,
you can do so by calling 223–REAL.
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