Ho Ho Ho; Belize Bank Part for Stella Maris kids

The students from Stella Maris were treated to a fancy carnival party on Wednesday, courtesy of the Belize Bank’s community outreach. Aside from the food and games, Santa and Misses Claus were on hand to deliver the well earned gifts to each student to make their Christmas more meaningful. Duane Moody joined in the celebrations.

Duane Moody, Reporting

Some one hundred and seventy five students, faculty and staff of the Stella Maris School including some parents were hosted at the school’s annual Christmas Party. The party which has been adopted by the Belize Bank Limited, for the fourth time in a row, was held this year at the St. John’s College Gymnasium.

Misty Michael

Misty Michael, Marketing Manager, Belize Bank

“We’re hosting the fourth annual Belize Bank Stella Maris Christmas Party. This year, we had a carnival theme for them, so they got to play different carnival games. We have popcorn, snow cones. Right now they are getting ready to have lunch and we are serving Christmas dinner so turkey, ham, rice and beans. And then around one o’clock we are expecting Santa to come and he will be bringing gifts for all of the kids.”

Dana Staine

Dana Staine, Acting Principal, Stella Maris School

“From since September, the bank notified us that they will be hosting the party so from then the students became to prepare themselves for this grand occasion today.  Each student will be taking home a gift and the gifts come from the staff members. Each staff member got a child to prepare a gift for that special child so they will be looking forward to that gift today.”

Held under a carnival theme, there were various gaming stations for the students, entertainment, face-painting from Misses Claus and gifts from Santa Claus. The students were excited and happy for the well deserved treat.

Cory Flowers

Cory Flowers, Student, Stella Maris School

“I got face paint. It is a snowflake.”

Duane Moody

“What are the other things that you are seeing; the performances. You are getting food, etc. Are you enjoying yourself?”

Cory Flowers

“Yes sir.  I play go-fishing. I play angry birds; I play can-flow.”

Trimane Vernon, Student, Stella Maris School

“It was really good. I got to play lots of games.”

Duane Moody

Trimane Vernon

“I know that they were several performances, their giving you food; there’s face-painting; there’s so much more. Tell us about that.”

Trimane Vernon

“Well performance was good as well. As soon as I’m done, I’m going to get my face painted.”

Acting Principal, Dana Staine, says that the event is important because it shares the meaning of Christmas with the one hundred and thirty-one students currently enrolled at the institution.

Dana Staine

“It is very important because most of our children come from low income families and the bank doing something for them like this is so a rewarding success for them.”

Misty Michael

“We decided that we don’t want to just do the Christmas Party for the kids, so we in a way adopted the school. So we look forward to doing this every year for them and for many of the kids this may be the only Christmas celebration that they have so we try to do as much as we possibly can within a budget to make it a really memorable event for them. And every time when they come you see their little faces light up and they are always excited to see what we have in store for them and this year it is no different.”

Dana Staine

“We are surely grateful, so on behalf of our General Manager, the staff and students, we would like to say a heartfelt thank you to the Belize Bank Management and staff for making this memorable occasion happening for us today.”

While for Marketing Manager of Belize Bank, Misty Michael, she says that the event would not have been possible if it were not for the collaborative effort of several entities.

Misty Michael

“I wanna thank the Belize Bank International Limited, our sister company; Caribbean Chicken, our face-painter today, Curly Sue as Misses Claus and of course the management and staff of Belize Bank because they really are the one that are hands-on in this project whether it is by donating the gifts or actually volunteering on the day of the event and we could not do it without their help.”

Duane Moody for News Five.