Damion Crawford | To our beloved children of Jamaica: Train to be champions; maximise your promise, potential and possibilities

This week marks the beginning of a brand-new school year, and as you step into your classrooms across our beautiful island, I want you to know Jamaica is counting on you, and I believe in you.

While some may see education primarily as the route to building a workforce, I see education first as the key to building a person, and then, through that person, constructing a society.

Education is, in fact, one of the foundation tools for the development of our youth. It facilitates your transition from dependence to independence, equipping you with knowledge, skills, values and confidence to take greater responsibility for yourself and your future.

However, the ultimate state of human existence is interdependence. This occurs when you can depend on your neighbour and similarly your neighbour can depend on you. Interdependence is achieved when you are able to stand on your own while contributing to something larger than just yourself.

Because education holds this immense power, I challenge you today to understand its purpose and to treat it with the reverence it deserves. Do not see school as an annoyance or a punishment. Instead, see it as the training ground of champions, no different than Usain Bolt before the Olympics, and Khadija ‘Bunny’ Shaw before the World Cup. Before the medals, goals and applause came the preparation, repetition, sacrifice and discipline.

FIVE THINGS TO HOLD TRUE THROUGHOUT THIS YEAR'S JOURNEY

As one of your leaders and the person assigned the shadow spokesperson of the education portfolio, I want to impart on you five things to hold true throughout this year's journey:

1. REMEMBER THE MATHEMATICS OF LIFE

Those who do more work in school often get the opportunity to do less strenuous work after school and earn more for doing it. Similarly, those who do less work in school often do more work after school and get less pay. Such is the mathematics of life.

The work you put in today expands the choices available to you tomorrow. Every book you read, every assignment you complete and every new skill you master is an investment in your future.

2. REMEMBER THAT SUCCESS REQUIRES SACRIFICE

There is no success without sacrifice. The discomfort you sometimes feel during preparation, study and test-taking is part of the payment you are depositing today towards the life you will thoroughly enjoy tomorrow.

There will be times when you would rather play than study, sleep than get up, or give up rather than try again. Remember that champions also have days when they do not feel like training. Sacrifice is giving up something you want now for something you want more in the future.

3. REMEMBER THERE IS A DIFFERENCE BETWEEN FAILING AND FAILURE

You will not understand everything immediately. Even your teacher did not understand everything on day one. You might be failing on day two. You might even be failing on day three. You may fail a test or struggle with a subject. But failing is not failure.

Failure does not come at the end of a class, the end of a day, the end of an examination or even on the day of graduation. Failure comes only when you surrender.

As long as you are prepared to get up, learn, practise, correct your mistakes and try again, the journey continues. Perseverance and constant effort prevent temporary failing from evolving into permanent failure.

4. BE YOUR BROTHER'S AND YOUR SISTER'S KEEPER

Knowledge is one of the few things in life that can be shared without losing it. Create synergies by working together, learning from each other and teaching each other.

Where you are strong, do not allow your friend to remain weak. Where you are weak, do not be ashamed to rely on your friend's strength.

Choose your associations wisely. I encourage you not to form crews of indiscipline and division but instead create crews of success. As friends, commit to attending school every day, to completing your work, to improving your grades, to becoming better students and to making your parents proud.

And you must challenge them to do the same.

5. REMEMBER THAT YOU ARE WHAT YOU TRAIN FOR

Build good habits. Train yourself to be punctual. Train yourself to be respectful. Train yourself to be focused. Train yourself to finish what you start. Set times for study, times for reflection, times for rest and times for play. Having established that schedule, develop the discipline to stick to it.

What you repeatedly practice eventually becomes part of who you are. That routine makes what was initially hard eventually easy.

Commit to the current 5 years of youth so you can enjoy the future 50 years of adulthood.

CONCLUSION

I know many of you are facing challenges and your circumstances, both real and perceived, may not be perfect. Some of you are dealing with overcrowded buses, unfinished classrooms, or infrastructure challenges. Others are dealing with home issues and financial strain. My promise to you is to never stop fighting for an improved education system that provides the highest probability for you to maximise your promise, your potential and your possibilities.

At the start of this school year, I hope that you achieve all your goals, create lifelong relationships, and soar to new heights. The journey of a thousand miles begins with the first step.

I beg of you one simple favour: commit yourself to the task of learning; so that Jamaica may, under God, increase in beauty, fellowship, and prosperity, and play our part in advancing the welfare of the whole human race.

- Damion O. Crawford, MP, is the Opposition Spokesperson on Education and Early Childhood Development. Email feedback to columns@gleanerjm.com. ONLINE ONLY COMMENTARY.