Cayman charity ARK celebrated a ‘dream come true’ Sunday as new Governor Jane Owen cut the ribbon on its new home following a four-month community effort to revive a neglected government building.
Hundreds of volunteers, including more than 70 visitors from a US company on a group retreat in Grand Cayman, helped add the finishing touches on Sunday, 30 April.
Children from ARK’s programmes were also involved, painting reading nooks and making custom tiles for the path that will link the property to the neighbouring John A. Cumber Primary School.
The building, which was once a school room and then a nursing station, had fallen into disrepair.
But government made the facility available to ARK on a five-year lease and the charity mobilised its community supporters for a rapid renovation.
Țara Nielsen, founder of the charity, thanked the community and ARK’s donors for a ‘miraculous effort’ to transform the building, saying it was a ‘dream come true’ for the non-profit to have a home base after 17 years.
It will primarily serve as the headquarters for ARK’s Mentor Educate Reinforce programme which provides intensive reading interventions to struggling children.
It will also be the administrative headquarters for ARK, which provides housing, food and utilities relief to those in need, as well as a home for after-school activities and literacy support for parents.
“We have got so many volunteers that have always wanted to lend services – from counselling to mindfulness to yoga, and everything else you can imagine – and we’re now going to have a location where we can schedule all these different practices to help these kids.”
Led by Grand Cayman firm SureBuilt Construction and with a key donation from principal sponsor, US education firm Edmentum, the project came together in fewer than four months.
Jamie Candee, the CEO of Edmentum, was among the workers applying the final coat of paint to the building on Sunday.
The business – which provides learning technology and support in 11,000 schools across the US – chose Grand Cayman as the location for its annual awards weekend for top-performing staff.
“Wherever we go to celebrate, we try to give back,” said Candee.
The company made a sizeable financial contribution to the cost of the renovation and its staff were on site Sunday to help finish the job.
“We’re doing a lot of the light construction and painting and putting together kind of the final pieces so the children can enjoy it.”
She added that ARK’s mission to mentor and educate children from at-risk communities was a perfect fit for the kind of project the business wanted to support.
Speaking at the event to officially open the property on Sunday, Minister for Innovation and Social Development André Ebanks said it was an innovative partnership between government and the charity that had helped make the most of limited resources.
Ebanks said the project could be a blueprint for transforming other under-utilised Crown assets into much-needed community services, potentially including a homeless shelter.
In this case, he said ARK’s home will also include an office for a Department of Children and Family Services staffer in order to allow government to expand its outreach in the community.
He said the swift action on the project was proof that with clear vision, God and community, “you can do amazing things in a short span of time”.
Owen, in one of her first public appearances since she being sworn in as governor last month, helped cut the ribbon to officially open the centre. She said she had been struck, in her first days in the role, by the concept of ‘Cayman kindness’ which she found embodied in the ARK project.
“Every day I learn a little bit more about what that Cayman kindness actually means. I can see it means the community coming together with their ideas, bringing lots of different skills together and creating something really meaningful.”
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