Hope Town’s Anna Albury trumps 115 candidates for student of the year title.
She’s been fully blind since birth, but this doesn’t matter to Anna Albury, the 12-year-old student at Hope Town School who was recently crowned Primary School Student of the Year over 115 of the brightest candidates from around the country.
“I am like just any other child. I do not look at myself as having a disability. I just happen to be blind,” said the sixth grader.
As she sat with the other student of the year nominees in the hall at Golden Gates Assemblies World Outreach Ministries International on Carmichael Road and she listened to the characteristics of the winner being extolled, she knew that it was her before they called her name.
“I was very excited. I was just waiting and waiting until they called my name,” says Anna. “I just knew it was me when they said I had won second in the speech competition and second in the district spelling bee. They said that I liked to swim and that I was in a swim meet. It was then when everyone knew it was me. It was so exciting.”
When they finally called the Hope Town Primary School head girl’s name, Anna, as the overall winner, she was honored. She was awarded a $6,000 scholarship.
Being named Primary School Student of the Year means a lot to the visually-impaired youngster. She says it allows her to show other students – especially those with disabilities – that they can do anything they want to do and be anything they want to be. She encourages them to remember if
they have a disability, that they shouldn’t use it as an excuse to hold them back from anything in life.
Fully blind from birth, Anna does not let that stand in her way. Although she could have easily been placed in the School for the Blind, her parents Theresa and Lambert Albury insisted that she be raised normally with other children. With their encouragement and the support of her teachers and classmates, Anna has been successfully mainstreamed and able to soar academically as well as any visually capable child and has maintained an outstanding 3.8 cumulative grade point average. She was awarded top academic achiever award in grades four, five and six. She also spread her
wings to other academic areas by entering the Abaco District Spelling Bee and placed second. She was also second runner up in the Rotary Club of Abaco’s Speech Competition.
The young achiever says she always yearns to fill her life with interesting things. In between studying she lives her life as adventurously as any other child.
“I am like just any other child. I do not look at myself as having a disability. I just happen to be blind,” says Anna. “I don’t let it stand in my way. I do everything anyone else does and I have fun doing it.”
The courageous primary school student of the year says her peers shouldn’t be afraid and worried not to do stuff. And she has tons of hobbies to prove it. She sails, swims, dives, plays the piano in her church, windsurfs, jumps off the dock, reads to an elderly woman in her community and does art.
“My parents [Theresa and Lambert Albury], have always pushed me to be more independent and I am happy they do because I can do most things on my own and I ask for help when I need it. But you just have to try and see what you can do first.”
It’s the infectious personality, excellent academic achievements and Anna’s genuine civic-mindedness that makes her an inspiration to the people in her community.
Hope Town School principal, Candace Key, says she and all the students at the school are proud of, and encouraged by Anna who they say is an inspiration to them all.
“We are more than proud of Anna,”?said Principal Key. “We are totally over the moon proud of her. We are thrilled.”
The school’s head describes Anna as a positive and hard-working child who is always smiling and giggling. “I don’t believe that I have seen a cross or any other look on her face. She is just excited about life, and truly lives each day and each minute to the utmost. So having her recognized is an
absolutely wonderful accomplishment. We have had another student, James Boyce, who also won this competition a few years back and that meant a lot to us as well. Many of our students do well from year-to-year and have been awarded in this award ceremony and it is a great thing to us, but Anna winning is so very special to us. She is really deserving of it.”
When Anna first entered Hope Town School in grade one, the school had never entered a blind student into its population. The principal says the staff had to learn how to work with Anna to bring out the best in her. She says smothering her and shielding her from everyday experiences was not an option, or the best thing for Anna either. With the help and support of her parents, the principal says they pushed Anna into doing her best.
And she says Anna does her best even though Anna faces daily challenges which she has accepted as just a part of her life and which do not bother her much at all. She often has to do things a bit differently from other students, to work in class, but she is happy and glad to try new things
whenever they come.
“I use Braille for Math and for the rest of my written classes I use a computer. It has a special program called JAWS [an acronym for Job Access With Speech is a screen reader, a software program for visually impaired users] that talks to me which is really helpful. I can write regularly and I know the keyboard very well. When I hit a key my computer tells me what I
wrote.”
Anna receives help from an aide who translates English into Braille so that she can read and study.
When it comes to getting around her school Anna does not ask for help as she knows the grounds well and she uses her cane to help her along. To navigate down stairs she does accept the assistance of her helpful classmates.
“I’ve never let my blindness determine what I can and can’t do,” says the 12-year-old who will be embarking on a new adventure come September when she heads to high school at Forest Heights Academy on mainland Abaco and her new adventure.
“I am excited about what will happen in the future. I am excited to go [to high school] because?I will be going with my friends as well as meeting new people. It will be interesting too, because I will have to catch the ferry everyday to go to school. I think it’s all a great thing.”
Although this top achiever is not sure what she wants to be when she grows up, she is far from worried. She says her strongest interests that she might want to pursue are music and art. Right now she is fully focused on getting the best education she can and hopes to realize her calling when the time is right.
“I believe that I can do anything and so I will,” says Anna. “I encourage other people to do the best they can and not let obstacles stand in their way. There is a lot that you can do if you just try.”
The Bahamas Primary School Student of the Year Foundation has been honoring the brightest, young minds of the nation for the last 15 years in a special ceremony which has left lasting impressions on young students.
Source: The Nassau Guardian