Minister in the Prime Minister’s Office with responsibility for Culture and the National Development Commission, John King; Argentine Ambassador to Barbados, Gustavo Martinez Pandiani; and Embassy and National Library Service officials pose with the young participants who received their diplomas on Friday evening.
Close to 100 young children joined the 500 million Spanish speakers across the world on Friday evening when they were presented with their diplomas in Level I Conversational Spanish. The course, which was conducted through a joint effort between the National Library Service and the Embassy of Argentina to Barbados, saw several of the participants being toasted during a short graduation ceremony at the Embassy after completing the course online.
With the COVID-19 pandemic forcing the already-planned course to be taken online, Ambassador Gustavo Martinez Pandiani, during his speech, expressed gratitude to the families of the participants and noted that the achievement of the youngsters was a great one.
“We had this crazy idea before the pandemic. We decided we were going to do a Spanish course, and then COVID hit us. But we demonstrated that we are stronger than the virus. The virus is very strong, but it was not strong enough to stop us from doing what we wanted to do, which is to bring more Spanish to your children,” Pandiani said.
Minister in the Prime Minister’s Office with responsibility for Culture and the National Development Commission, John King, was on-hand to present the diplomas and he echoed the sentiments of the Ambassador, adding that there was one single positive that came out of the emergence of the pandemic and that was allowing for larger numbers. With an original count of 30 that was earmarked for the physical iteration of the class, the move to a virtual class allowed for 90 children to take in the course.
Noting that all students were eligible to take in the Level II course which starts on Monday and is set to run for eight weeks, Minister King stated that this initiative took Barbados one step closer to realising its dream of becoming a bilingual country.
“The National Library Service and the Argentine Embassy are truly to be commended for this effort. It demonstrates their commitment to this project as a means of assisting in the fulfillment of this country’s mandate of becoming a bilingual society,” he said.
A passionate Pandiani, who said that all his work was aimed at bringing the peoples of both countries closer together, said that there were hopes to host sessions for adults in the near future. (MP)