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The St. Stanislaus College Farm has to be seen within the context of various happenings during the year 1972-3 when I assumed the position of Principal of St. Stanislaus in July 1972. This was an exciting time, with the announced goal of feeding the nation by 1976. 

It is important to note that the first major change was that of the Prospectus that had been in use since 1866. Here, the aim was stated as giving a “good liberal education” i.e. a grammar-type education in keeping with the models available at the time. A committee, comprising Fr. Bob Barrow S.J., the Guidance Counsellor, and others, worked very hard in crafting a new Prospectus, and changed the wording to “imparting intellectual and technical skills”, to which was added at a later date “social skills” i.e. a move to a multilateral-type model. This did not go down very well with some parents who had been brought up to think of education as that of only the Arts and Sciences, and were naturally afraid of any innovation including manual labour and working the land as the source of our wealth. 

Within this context, the SSC Association under its new President, Mr. Rafiq Khan, formed a Farm and a Workshop Sub-committees to examine ways of transforming the 16 acre land into a productive unit and to look at the introduction of technical education at the Brickdam site. The Sophia land had been bought by the Jesuits as a site for a new College when the political directorate seemed bent on seizing the Brickdam site. It had lain fallow for some time, and squatters had taken it over, claiming prescriptive rights to the complex. 

The Farm was considered to have 4 aims:

1. Primarily, as an aid in teaching Agricultural Science, eventually achieving Gold medal status of 2 GCE (later CSEC) subjects;

2. As a commercial enterprise that would pay for itself out of the sale of produce;

3. As an effective correlation with other subjects e.g. biology, mathematics, geography, economics, social studies, physics, chemistry, etc.

4. As a useful link with technical education, emphasizing the value of manual work. This would

eventually be expanded to include Food and Nutrition. 

All students would be exposed to agricultural science education in Forms 1 and 2, spending 1 day each week at the Farm, as well as to technical education and home economics at the Brickdam premises. They then could choose to proceed to GCE (later CSEC) when they reached Form 3, if they wished to do so. This would enable them to learn by doing, and their parents would be invited to offer their labour on weekends when the actual work was done by self-help. 

The Farm construction was not without dramatic moments. I well remember one Christmas Day, knee-deep in mud as we tried to prevent a catastrophic flooding. The pumps had broken down, the vegetable crops were destroyed, and the livestock was in danger. Somehow, we managed to save the chicken pens, and the crisis was averted. 

The Workshop was opened on 4 December, 1974, by Dr. Ptolomey Reid, at the time Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Agriculture and National Development, whose son Herman was a student at the College, and the Farm on 25 September, 1975, by the Hon. Minister of Agriculture, Mr. G. B. Kennard. 

The Farm Sub-committee, headed by Dr. Peter Fernandes, and the Workshop Sub-committee by Mr. Noel Gonsalves, included many whose names are etched into the history of Saints. At some time, a permanent record should be made of these stalwarts who gave freely of their time and resources to promote the Farm and Workshop. We owe a lot to these men and women, some of whom are no longer with us. Of special mention is the Fernandes family: Peter, Bobby, Billy, Chris, Bunny, John Jon., and the generations of Fernandes whose contribution is still ongoing to this day. A very special thanks is owed to Mr. John Fernandes Snr. who set up the SSC Association in 1943. 

 

Saint Stanislaus College Farm - Copyright 2008