Former chief education officer, Jasper Lawrence has committed over 40 years of sterling and exceptional service to education and social development in Jamaica.
Though retired in 2010, he is very much actively involved in education and giving of his service to help improve lives.
“It feels even more rewarding working for nothing travelling to these schools, not only to board meetings, but going there to conduct seminars and relating to teachers and students. I think the (education) system has been quite good to me,” Mr Lawrence said in an interview with the North Coast Times.
He has gone through the ranks in education from a pre-trained teacher, to secondary education teacher, principal, territorial education officer and to chief education officer.
The native of St Ann has blossomed and grown into a successful human being, a gentleman whose life is worth emulating as he continues to motivate society.
Jasper Lawrence is a Christian and an active member and elder of the Runaway Bay United Church in St Ann.
He is also chairman of the Charge Elders’ Board and a member of the Central Missions Council of The UCJCI, as well as a life member of the Bible Society of The West Indies. In addition, he now serves as a member of the Discovery Bay Preparatory School Boards, Vice Chairman of Brown’s Town High, Chairman of Iona High and Lower Buxton All-age, as well as director of The Law College of The Americas and The Hydel University College.
“I live by the philosophy that all of us have the capacity to bring out the best in other people if we understand them well enough. So when we have difficulty bringing out the best in other people, it is because we don’t understand them significantly and we should never give up on people,” Mr Lawrence said.
This is one of the reasons he does not believe in “expelling a youngster to waste a life.”
EARLY BEGINNINGS
Life for this outstanding Jamaican man began in the community of Retirement, just two and a half miles out of Brown’s Town. He was the seventh of nine children for, Nathan and Ivy Lawrence. Though he admits that his family was somewhat poor, they never thought of themselves as such.
“Yes we were poor, but we didn’t consider ourselves much to be poor. My father was a small farmer and my mother was a housewife. There were a few cows, goats, pigs and chickens and ground provisions. So we were never hungry and we didn’t know that we were poor,” he explained.
For young Jasper and his siblings, there were the normal chores before school, such as taking water to the cows and donkey or fetching fire wood.
Church was also integral to his upbringing as he had to attend every Sunday school at the United Pentecostal Church in Retirement.
Young Jasper’s early education started out at the Retirement Basic School, from there he went to Brown’s Town Primary School and later to Brown’s Town Secondary School (now High School). Interestingly, when the school was reclassified as a junior secondary school, Jasper Lawrence was one of the first batch of students to attend the school under the leadership of the principal, Mr C.E. Atkinson.
Mr Lawrence said that Mr Atkinson always encouraged him to venture into education. However his first job was as a store clerk at Wallace C. Nam Limited, a hardware, furniture and haberdashery store in Brown’s Town,. He attended private lessons in the evening, while he worked in the days.
ENTRY INTO EDUCATION
After a three-month course at Caenwood Junior College in Kingston, in 1970, Japer Lawrence went to Keith All Age School in Keith district, as a pre trained teacher.
With encouragement from the principal of Keith All Age, Thomas Jarrett, Mr Lawrence’s next step was to the Mico College in September of 1971. He studied for two years and did one year of internship at Alps All Age School Trelawny. Mr Lawrence explained that during his one year of internship, he started doing community work as well as preaching and participating at several activities at the Baptist and New Testament church in Alps and a Pentecostal church in Ulster Spring.
After graduating with his trained teacher’s certificate, Mr Lawrence taught mathematics and general science from grades seven to nine at Alexandria Secondary School (now Aabuthnott Gallimore High School).
His stay there was brief as after one year, he was called by people from Trelawny, impressed by his earlier work there, to take over Bellevue All Age School (now Bellevue Primary and Junior High School) in Perth Town, Trelawny in September of 1975.
With his thirst for further educational qualification, in 1977, Mr Lawrence pursued a certificate in Education at UWI and later received a scholarship from the Ministry of Education to pursue a Bachelor’s degree in Educational Administration, which he successfully attained with distinction in 1980.
He returned in 1980, to Bellevue All Age School where he continued to serve as principal until 1982, sharply increasing the school’s successes in the Common Entrance Examination.
EDUCATION OFFICER
In 1982, Jasper Lawrence was employed as territorial education officer with the Ministry of Education. At that time, while pursuing a Masters Degree in education administration at UWI, he was offered scholarship to do Master’s Degree in literacy instructions at the Michigan State university.
“The problems that really caused me to pursue that degree in literacy instruction were the challenges I saw that the youngsters had in doing the other subjects. Even when I taught the students other subjects, such as mathematics and general science at Alexandria Secondary School, it was more teaching them reading,” Mr Lawrence explained.
In his new capacity as territorial education officer, he was responsible for supervising all primary and all age schools in Trelawny and South West St Ann.
Mr Lawrence noted that although being younger than several of the principals and the teachers at that time, he received their cooperation.
PROMOTION
In 1991, Mr Lawrence was promoted to the position of senior education officer and worked in Kingston and he later went on to Region Three.
For a short while when he worked in Region One and he also worked as senior education officer at the regional office in Region Six.
More elevation came for Mr Lawrence in 2001, when he was asked to serve as regional director for Region Four, which comprised the parishes of St James, Hanover and Westmoreland.
“It was quite a good experience. I got cooperation from the principals and school boards. We tried to see what they were doing well and shared best practices among the schools. I enjoyed that experience very well working with them. We managed to do some significant work in literacy and numeracy,” explained Mr Lawrence.
He later rose to the position of deputy chief education officer, where he supervised the six regions, working collaboratively with the six regional directors.
Mr Lawrence said that it was out of encouragement from others that he went and applied for the position of chief education officer. He was successful and he assumed the position in 2006 and until his retirement in 2010.
Mr Lawrence was able to serve on several boards and commissions including the Council of University of Technology (UTECH), board member of the Early Childhood Commission, National Council for Technical and Vocational Education and Training, Chairman of National Committee of Caribbean Examinations Council, along with others.
ACHIEVEMENTS
“I value that I was able during the last few years to offer some guidance away from expanding All Age Schools to expanding secondary schools of choice. We managed to do some major infrastructural work at schools, such as Bishop Gibson High and York Castle High School. We also did expansions at Titchfield High as well. I also got a lot of satisfaction from getting many of the upgraded high schools performing as well as and even better than the traditional high schools in some cases. Some of these high schools that excelled are Black River, Old Harbour High, Ocho Rios High and Denbigh High. This was also due to the transformational leadership of those principals at the time,” Mr Lawrence pointed out.
AWARDS
For Jasper Lawrence’s exceptional work in education and social development, he has received a plethora of awards from several organizations. Among those are: Trelawny Principals’ Association Award for Outstanding Contribution to Education in the parish and Jamaica (1993); Perth Town Community, Bellevue All Age Past Students Association and Parent Teachers Association Joint Award for outstanding service to the school and community (1993); Jamaica Education Officers’ Association Special Award for Outstanding Service (1996); Jamaica Civil Service Long Service Award (2001); Jamaica Education Officers’ Association Award for Consistent Service (2008); Jamaica Teachers’ Association Golden Torch (2009) and the Prime Minister’s Gold Medal of Appreciation for Outstanding Service to Education (2009).
He also has received several awards from various institutions that he has been involved with. The most recent he received on February 24, 2017 from his alma mater Brown’s Town High School.
FAMILY LIFE
Jasper Lawrence had been married 37 years to Clover, who sadly passed away on November 6, 2011. Her last assignment he noted was as principal of the Brown’s Town Primary School.
Together their union produced three children: Nadine Leblanc, a professor in Florida, along with two sons, Donwell, a consultant engineer, and Kerry, a medical sales representative.
Mr Lawrence noted that he is happy that their children were all married before the passing of his late wife and they all are Christians.
Today, Mr Lawrence is now engaged and said that he is enthusiastic about marrying Tanisha Reid, who is a trained graduate teacher and also pursuing a career in nursing.
“I have everything to give God thanks for. The people I have worked with over the years have been kind, supportive, cooperative and it is because I find the willingness and cooperation of the people, why I continue to work,” said Jasper Lawrence, a GEM in the eyes of many.
