Former BBN employee Casiana Lind awarded Galen’s Dame Minita Gordon Scholarship

Published by BBNTEAM at October 26, 2021

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Posted: Tuesday, October 26, 2021. 5:53 pm CST.

By Rubén Morales Iglesias: Governor General Froyla Tzalam officially presented Casiana Lind with the Dame Minita Gordon Scholarship to study at Galen University in Cayo on Thursday, October 21, 2021.

The Dame Minita Gordon scholarship is a full-tuition scholarship in honour of Belize’s first Governor General Dame Minita Gordon.

Monica Manzur, Director of Students Affairs at Galen University, described Lind, a secondary education student at Galen, as a student ‘with a passion for education, as an eloquent, intelligent, critical thinker who displayed leadership skills and saw the Dame Minita Gordon Scholarship as a platform to send a message of empowerment to Belizean women’.

Governor General Froyla Tzalam, in making the presentation said Dame Minita was a pioneer and trail blazer in formal education advising Lind to always remember that Dame Minita was tenacious and like Dame Minita Gordon, Casiana should reach within herself during difficulty times to find her inner value of hard work and pride.

“It is only right when it comes to the first ever scholarship in the honour of our first Governor General who was also the first Belizean to get a Doctorate in Psychology. She was a woman of many firsts, so it is only appropriate that a young Belizean woman would be the one selected to receive the scholarship and try to keep her legacy alive because she has such a rich legacy and figures like that should not be washed away in history because without figures like that Belize probably wouldn’t be Belize, the Belize we know it as today,” Lind said in an exclusive conversation with Breaking Belize News (BBN) where she worked full time for a while doing marketing, sales, and live shows.

So how does she intend to promote the values of Dame Minita Gordon?

“The first thing that I would like to get into is get active in the terms of educating not only my colleagues at Galen, but also eventually the public, more about who Dame Minita Gordon was, what she stood for, and her motto in life, and what she lived for which was education and Belize,” said Lind who is very appreciative for the scholarship.

“The scholarship means a step forward in education, a step forward for women, and a step forward for keeping a rich Belizean history alive,”

Twenty-four-year-old Lind studied at Santa Elena Primary School, was Valedictorian at Saint Ignatius High School in Santa Elena, before majoring in Biology at Sacred Heart Junior College in San Ignacio. But studying was not everything Lind did. While working her for her Associates Degree, she also worked at BBN and at the Ariston Marketing call center.

At Galen, she’s switching from Biology to a major in Secondary Education with a minor in Belizean Studies and Social Studies College.

“I love me being versatile and I think that through studying I did find out that I wanted to be an educator. I would like to be at the secondary level, whether it’s in the field meaning actually teaching or eventually helping in an administrative role at a secondary school probably somewhere here in Cayo, give back to the community in terms of Santa Elena. Definitely it is a change but it is where my heart is leading me right now,” she said.

Though the official scholarship presentation was just made, Lind is already nearly midway into the opening Fall Semester and is looking forward to a bright and challenging future.

“In terms of the future, I see myself growing more into the Galen culture, which is excellent, and finding my place, not only in Galen but also finding my place in terms of my role to play in the promotion of the legacy of the Dame Minita Gordon, and also finding my place after Galen,” she said.

“So, I definitely see myself becoming more connected with my community with my colleagues. Who knows maybe I am given an opportunity to connect in a much larger scale and if so, then I’ll take that, but for now, I guess it’s just figuring it out.”

But while she figures it out, Casiana Lind is active with the Environmental and Journalism clubs, and thankful for the opportunities coming her way.

“Thanks to my family, to Galen University, and, of course, God for giving me life so that I can go ahead and pursue whatever it is that He has in plan for me.”

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