School of the Nations was founded by Dr. Brian O’Toole and his wife Pamela O’Toole. In 1996 Brian was undertaking a UNICEF consultancy in West Africa. One weekend he was free and a friend took him to Lome in Togoland to see a private school operated by a young couple. That brief visit was highly significant. It proved to be the inspiration for School of the Nations in Guyana. That visit was in April and by September of that year School of Nations opened its doors.
We would like to thank some of the pioneer families from twenty-eight years ago who entrusted their children to our care when Nations was just a vision. To Ian and Mary McDonald, Bernie and Anita Fernandes, Mr. & Mrs. Hilbert Shields, the Lyes, Mr. and Mrs. Williams and others thank you for your faith in our hopes.
From that inauspicious birth in an impoverished West African country Nations has surely come a long way.
Nations now operates well-developed preschool, primary and secondary departments and has welcomed students from 47 countries over the past twenty-eight years.
Nations is delighted to have a number of students with special needs including children with Down Syndrome, vision and hearing impairments and Autism fully integrated into the regular school. In addition, a number of children with profound disabilities attend the Special Unit which is part of School of the Nations.
In the 5th & 6th Forms (11th and 12th grades) the students write the prestigious University of Cambridge IGCSE and Advanced Level examinations. Nations’ 6th Formers have gone on to earn Undergraduate, Masters and PhD degrees from some of the top Universities internationally.
An integral part of the 6th Form experience is the service project where students work in orphanages, the special unit attached to Nations, tutor children in language or maths skills or work on the Tiger Bay project. More than 30 children from Tiger Bay come into Nations 2 or 3 times per week to benefit from tutoring in Maths, English, and Computer Skills.
It has therefore been a long journey from that visit to Lome in West Africa. But my wife and I have been enriched by every step taken over the past twenty-eight years and look forward eagerly to what the future has in store for the Nations family.
– Brian and Pam O’Toole