U.B., Belmopan celebrate birthdays
Classes may be out for the summer and the University of Belize’s central campus in Belmopan may seem empty indeed, but this did not stop the kick-off of a month of celebrations for the University of Belize’s fifth anniversary. The Chairman of the Board and the President took the opportunity to examine just how far the amalgamation of five distinct tertiary institutions has come, and what still needs to be done.
Dr. Louis Zabaneh, Chairman of the Board, U.B.
?At this point, we feel that the university is somewhat dispersed, and these are important issues that we are analyzing. We are looking at the cost of offering the education at the different campuses, we have a campus in Toledo, one at Central Farm in Cayo, we have two in Belize City, I should say three with the Faculty of Education almost moving up completely to Belmopan, and we have the central campus here. That still leads to some inefficiencies because we have a lot of space to cover and we have all these campuses to maintain. However, to give more accessibility sometimes there has to be some additional cost.?
Karla Heusner, Reporting
U.B. President Dr. Corinth Morter-Lewis says that while the consolidation of the administrative staff is well underway, the university is still working to create cohesion and a sense of belonging for all U.B. students, wherever they may be.
Dr. Corinth Morter-Lewis, President U.B.
?Right now we have consolidated the University of Belize in terms of our administrative offices here in Belmopan. We have brought all our fulltime day programmes, except in the case of management and social sciences. In fact we have two faculties, not two faculties, one faculty, but we have students in both places in Belize City and Belmopan. We have right now been able to establish our administrative team fairly strong at this point and we also have a faculty compliment of about one hundred and two, I think.?
?The other thing we are doing is building what we call a U.B. culture. Because of how we were established, five separate entities coming together to form one, that has been one of the challenges we have been facing over the years. And bit by bit we are bringing that together and beginning to consolidate it.?
Special Guest at today?s anniversary celebration was the Foreign Minister of the Dominican Republic.
Carlos Morales Troncoso, Foreign Min. Dominican Republic
?In the Dominican Republic we do have many similarities with Belize, especially in the areas of trade and tourism. We?ve had a very broad conversation and I am a firm believer that with my visit and with the upcoming visit of Prime Minister Said Musa and of Foreign Minister to the Dominican Republic, it will serve to strengthen our relations.?
While at U.B., members of the delegation from the Dominican Republic spoke with the Director of U.B.?s Regional Language Centre about opportunities for employees of the Playa Dorado Hotel chain to learn English in Belize. U.B. day was celebrated this year in conjunction with the thirty-fifth anniversary of the founding of Belmopan.
Anthony Chanona, Mayor of Belmopan
?Today we are celebrating thirty-five years of a positive decision. Back then perhaps there was a lot of naysayers, opinions anxiety, but Mr. Price was forthright, he was constant and as the saying goes, ?whenever you combine constancy to purpose there is success.? Today, we celebrate the success of Belmopan, a thriving young city of eighteen thousand people. We are celebrating tremendous growth in our city, and of course we are celebrating fives year of U.B., a very important part of Belmopan?s future. And so we are here to plant some more trees.?
Thirty-five trees were planted this afternoon at the U.B. campus to celebrate the U.B. and Belmopan anniversaries. Karla Heusner Reporting for News Five.
The Chairman of U.B. took the opportunity of today’s celebrations to launch a code of conduct for all board members. Activities continue throughout the month of August.
