First Lady opens First Aid, CPR course for Early Childhood Development participants
Georgetown, Guyana – (June 26, 2017) First Lady, Mrs. Sandra Granger, today, declared open another First Aid, Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation (CPR) and the use of the Automated External Defibrillator (AED) training workshop for 36 women at the Guyana Red Cross Society (GRCS) in Kingston, Georgetown. The workshop is the second component of the three-part Early Childhood Development Workshop and successful completion will result in the certification of participants.
First Lady, Mrs. Sandra Granger (seated, third from left) is flanked by, from left to right by Ms. Melissa Armstrong, trainer, Guyana Red Cross Society (GRCS), General Secretary of the GRCS, Mrs. Dorothy Fraser and Lieutenant Colonel (ret’d) Yvonne Smith of the Office of the First Lady. The participants are pictured standing.
In her address, the First Lady urged the women to participate fully in the compact programme. “[These] are skills will not only [benefit] you in your vocation of looking after little children… What you’re doing here is learning how to be professionals in your care of children but you will also be able to carry that knowledge to other areas,” she said.
The First Lady also noted that her office had first engaged the GRCS to provide training for participants in the ‘Care For the Elderly’ workshop, which ended in May and she is pleased to continue the collaboration with the charity.
General Secretary of the GRCS, Mrs. Dorothy Fraser expressed similar sentiments, noting that she is pleased that the Office of the First Lady has continued to provide training through the GRCS, which aims to save lives, prevent injury and promote recovery. She told the participants that “it means when you finish, there will be… 36 homes each [which] will have somebody trained in First Aid”.
Meanwhile, several of the participants said that they were eager to learn new skills, especially those that they may be able to use to render assistance.
In an invited comment, Ms. Shameza Baksh, an Islamic teacher at the Meten-Meer-Zorg Islamic Academy said that she was glad that her employers selected her to participate in a workshop. “I think everybody should have the knowledge of helping someone when they’re in need… and I am looking forward to gaining a lot; grasping a lot from these sessions,” she said.
Ms. Tashawna Hackett, another participant noted that as a young mother she believes it is important to have this life changing skill. “I am a young mother and I have a baby and… so participating is going to teach me a lot [about] how to better take care of my child and it might teach me something that might just, any day, save my child’s life,” she said.
Some of the participants in the workshop.
Ms. Faziela Imandin, a teacher, said that she is participating in the workshop to learn how to render the best care to her students should they have an accident during school hours.