The Basil Charles Educational Foundation awarded scholarships and bursaries to seventeen students at a ceremony held at the Basil’s Bar in Villa on Tuesday, July 25th, 2023.
Seven of the students received full scholarships while ten received bursaries. As part of the programme, the awardees will receive financial assistance from forms one to five.
Founder of the Basil Charles Educational Foundation, Basil Charles, said the foundation started almost three decades ago when he and one of his friends decided to host a Blues Festival on Mustique and on St. Vincent. He said they agreed to use the proceeds of the events to provide scholarships for economically disadvantaged students. “Since then, we have helped children in many different ways, we took on pre-school and all the other different areas,” Charles said. He noted that thus far, the foundation has assisted close to two thousand (2000) children.
Charles said they usually ask parents and guardians to provide them with information about their financial background and then they select the children that they think are most needy rather than just the students who have the best grades. Explaining how the EC $1500.00 scholarships is distributed, Charles said EC$600.00 is provided to the recipients in the first school term, and EC$450.00 in the subsequent terms. He said the foundation assisted displaced families by providing beds and other necessary items during the covid-19 pandemic and the volcanic eruptions, to make their lives more comfortable. He noted that they have also assisted preschools by providing cots and meals for the preschoolers.
Meanwhile, the 2016 Basil Charles Scholarship Awardee, Marika Baptiste, said she is proud of the establishment and the role it plays in aiding students in their academic advancement, and also for all that she has been able to achieve with its support.
The Basil Charles Education Foundation is a non-profit organization dedicated to providing crucial scholarships and support to students in St. Vincent and the Grenadines. Founded in 1996 by Basil Charles, Founder of Basil’s Bar Mustique, the foundation seeks to make quality education accessible to vulnerable children from economically disadvantaged backgrounds