GAWU establishes the “GAWU Labour College” – Cde Navin Chandarpal appointed Principal

The Guyana Agricultural and General Workers Union (GAWU) will be advancing its workers education and training programmes with the establishment of the GAWU Labour College. The College is housed in the recently completed building adjacent to the Union’s Headquarters in High Street, Kingston, Georgetown.

The Union is also pleased to announce the appointment of Comrade Navin Chandarpal as the Principal of the GAWU Labour College. Comrade Chandarpal has been associated with GAWU’s Education Classes as a Lecturer since 1980 and had also lectured in the nineteen eighties in education programmes run by the Guyana Public Service Union and the Critchlow Labour College. Prior to his appointment as a Presidential Adviser, Comrade Chandarpal served for many years as a Secondary School Teacher, a Lecturer at the Cyril Potter College of Education and the University of Guyana.

GAWU had been providing Education programmes for its members at its former Headquarters in Regent Street which was completely destroyed in the post election fires of 2001. While we have continued to hold Education and Training programmes for our members in various locations, we have had to suspend our two and three weeks Residential Classes which had contributed significantly to the improvement of the skills of hundreds of our members in the past. We are now poised to resume the Residential Classes and to expand and intensify our out-reach programmes.

In addition to enhancing our members skills that serve them well in their day-to-day work-life, GAWU’s educational programmes cover a wide range of subjects. Included among these are the history and struggles of GAWU; history of Trade Unionism in Guyana; the International Working Class Movement and the landmark achievements of its struggles and activities; the historic role of workers as a class especially in influencing socio-economic changes. Our educational work also seeks to deepen participants knowledge about Guyana while, at the same time, raise their awareness of world developments and current trends and issues.

As in the past, our educational programmes will rely on the assistance of several guest lecturers who will cover several subject areas. Such involvement is intended to widen the knowledge base of our members, simultaneously equipping them to ably and responsibly carry out their duties as workers/citizens.

GAWU will be officially opening the College in the month of March as a tribute to the great Teacher and Mentor of the Working Class, our Late Honorary President, Comrade Cheddi Jagan.