作者： admin

On a recent Tuesday at its Barbados campus, Ross University School of Medicine (RUSM), a private for-profit medical institution, awarded a series of grants to 11 local charitable organizations spanning health services, social advocacy, youth development, and community support. The initiative is designed to deepen cross-sector community partnerships and scale up critical support systems for vulnerable populations across the island.

The 11 recipient organizations cover a broad spectrum of community needs: Verdun House Substance Abuse Foundation, the Rotary Club of Barbados, Rotary Club of Barbados South, Caribbean Colon Cancer Initiative, Healthier Nation Initiative Foundation, Hope Foundation, Heart and Stroke Foundation of Barbados, Barbados Alliance to End Homelessness, Eden Lodge Youth Charitable Trust, Barbados Breastfeeding and Child Nutrition Foundation, and the Pleion Foundation. Each group has a decades-long track record of addressing unmet social and health needs in local communities across Barbados.

During the short award ceremony, Dr. Rhonda McIntyre, Senior Associate Dean of External Affairs at RUSM, opened with remarks that framed the grant distribution as more than a financial transaction. She emphasized that the event was a public recognition of the profound commitment, compassionate outreach, and transformative vision that each recipient organization brings to the communities they serve.

“Each of these organizations fills a critical gap in addressing pressing social and health challenges across Barbados, while working to build a more inclusive, healthy future for all Barbadians,” McIntyre noted. “Whether you are developing safe, supportive spaces for young people to grow, expanding access to life-saving essential healthcare, or lifting up unhoused community members, your work drives tangible, daily improvement to people’s lives across the country. We are deeply honored to stand alongside you as you advance this important, noble mission.”

While the university did not publicly disclose the total monetary value of the combined grants, McIntyre made clear that RUSM’s commitment to local community groups extends far beyond one-time financial contributions. She explained that this ongoing partnership is rooted in the core values shared by RUSM and its parent company, Covista Communications, which has long championed the impact of collaborative community work. “This is not just a financial commitment; it is a commitment to building long-term relationships rooted in mutual respect and a shared goal of lifting up all Barbadians,” McIntyre said.

Beyond supporting the critical work of local charities, the partnership also offers unique, formative learning opportunities for RUSM medical students completing their studies on the island. McIntyre explained that hands-on engagement with community organizations gives students real-world experience that cannot be taught in a traditional lecture hall, complementing their formal academic medical training.

“Our students come to Barbados to study medicine, but they gain far more than the knowledge we deliver in the classroom,” McIntyre said. “The work they do alongside your teams—listening to community members, learning about local challenges, and lending their time and skills to support your missions—shapes them into the empathetic, community-centered physicians and leaders they will become in their future careers. You teach them empathy, adaptability, and the core value of service to others that no textbook can fully convey.”

The ceremony was documented through official photography by Shamar Blunt of Barbados TODAY, capturing the grant presentations to leadership from the Hope Foundation, Caribbean Colon Cancer Initiative, and Barbados Breastfeeding and Child Nutrition Foundation.

Barbados’ recently passed Criminal Gangs (Prevention and Control) Act has earned qualified support from two long-time community advocates who work directly with at-risk young people and current/former gang members, who say the legislation is a critical tool to curb rising gang-related violence — but stress that enforcement alone cannot solve the crisis of youth gang involvement, and that unaddressed biases could put law-abiding residents in high-risk neighborhoods in harm’s way.

The legislation, approved by Parliament last week, introduces sweeping new measures to combat gang activity: it formally criminalizes gang membership, recruitment, and financial backing for criminal groups, sets mandatory minimum prison sentences for gang-connected offenses, expands law enforcement powers, allows for witness anonymity to protect witnesses from retaliation, and strengthens the state’s ability to seize civil assets linked to gang activity.

Winston Iston Bull Branch, a former block leader from Chapman Lane, and Roger Husbands — a youth activist, criminologist and founder of the Drug Education and Counselling Services (DECS) — both agree the new law is a necessary step given the steady rise in youth participation in gangs and violent crime across the country. But both are clear: the law will only deliver long-term results if policymakers pair enforcement with targeted interventions to address the deep social and economic inequities that push vulnerable young people into gang life in the first place.

Branch, who has decades of firsthand experience working with young people in high-crime neighborhoods, traced many of the drivers of gang involvement back to fractured family structures and systemic gaps in education. “Many young people grow up without stable home environments; a large number are born to parents who are not prepared to raise them, and family breakdown creates enormous pressure that pushes kids out onto the street,” he explained. He also criticized the national education system for abandoning struggling students, leaving many young people without basic literacy and numeracy skills when they leave school, with few legitimate pathways to stable employment.

While Branch noted that legitimate entry-level work and trade apprenticeships are currently available across the country, he added that many disenfranchised young men opt out of formal work, choosing instead to spend their days socializing on neighborhood blocks in the hopes of advancing in local gang hierarchies. “Most don’t realize that only a tiny handful ever reach leadership positions in these organizations,” he said. “The vast majority end up as disposable foot soldiers, caught in a cycle of violence that almost never ends well.”

He also pointed to a dangerous shift in gang dynamics in recent years: younger gang members who now have easy access to firearms are increasingly acting independently, rather than following orders from senior gang leaders, leading to more spontaneous, unpredictable violence across communities.

Despite his support for the legislation, Branch raised one urgent red flag: law-abiding residents who live in neighborhoods that are broadly labeled as “gang-affiliated” are at high risk of being caught up in enforcement actions as collateral damage. “The problem is that innocent people are going to get hurt,” he argued. “Most people who live in these areas just want to go to work, come home, relax, and live peacefully. They don’t have any connection to gangs, but they live in an area that’s been branded as criminal, so they end up under suspicion.”

Husbands echoed the call for balanced implementation of the new law, acknowledging that many Barbadians who live in high-risk neighborhoods are already worried about being unfairly targeted based on where they live, what they wear, who they associate with, or their general appearance. But he expressed cautious confidence that the legislation’s requirement for formal investigative processes will help separate innocent civilians from active gang members. “I understand the concern that people might feel targeted just for being in the wrong place or knowing the wrong person,” he said. “But the law requires thorough investigation before any action is taken, which should help sort out innocent people from those actually involved in criminal activity.”

Like Branch, Husbands emphasized that enforcement is only one piece of the solution. He called for the government to roll out targeted support and rehabilitation programs alongside the new law, to help at-risk and current gang members exit criminal life and build sustainable alternative futures. “We need to create dedicated anti-gang support groups that offer therapy, life skills training, and employment assistance to people who want to leave gangs behind,” he explained.

Drawing on years of his own research into gang involvement in Barbados, Husbands explained that most young people who join gangs are not inherently criminal — they are searching for the sense of identity, belonging, and purpose that they have not been able to find in their families, schools, or broader communities. He also uncovered a key structural pressure that pushes new recruits into violent street crime: most gangs require new members to pay regular financial dues to maintain their membership and standing in the group. “Young recruits have to hit a specific quota of money every period to stay in the gang,” he said. “That’s why you see so many bold, daytime robberies these days — these kids aren’t robbing for fun, they’re robbing to meet their quota and protect their own safety within the group.” Without addressing these underlying social and financial drivers, he warned, even aggressive enforcement will not reduce gang activity long-term.