Current projects - updated March 2023
Over the years the Learning Links International team have supported various projects but for the past few years Liz Millman has been working with members of the Pennants Community Development Committee, the Rotary Clubs of May Pen, Clarendon, Jamaica, and North Wales with a focus in improving the buildings at the Pennants Community Centre, the John Austin Primary School and Pennants Basic School.
The Pennants Project team have applied for funds from various organisations, eg some rotten windows at the John Austin All Age School were replaced in 2015 with funds transferred by the North Wales Jamaica Society, who were given support from the Pennant family's Laspen Trust.
More recently the newly established 'Douglas Pennant Family Foundation' have been building a relationship with the school and funds were sent with support from the Rotary Clubs of Bangor and May Pen to help secure the perimeter with fencing and a front wall.
May Pen Rotary Club also supported Literacy Day at the school in 2018 and the North Wales Jamaica Society provided funds for staff training at JAAAS and funds to improve the perimeter fencing at the Pennants Basic School.
Funding from the Rhona Reid Charitable Trust enabled Jamaican Poet, Yasus Afari, to work with school students in Pennants and in Bangor, North Wales on a joint writing project called 'Building Bridges'.
The Rotary Clubs in North Wales and May Pen were working with Learning Links International to support the John Austin Primary School to prepare a proposal for Rotary International funding to create an Early Years Centre and to provide training for parents, however this has stalled.
We are now working to establish an ongoing link with the the Clarendon Parish Development Committee to establish regualr support from the Douglas Pennant Family Foundation.
We are also working with the Pennants Community Development Committee's Local History Team to explore the story of Robert Rumble and the Tennants Strike Click Here