The Jamaica Star :: Entertainment :: Bob Marley institute for western Jamaica

Krista Henry, Staff Reporter

Ras Astor Black - Richard Morais

When it is officially opened, the Bob Marley School for the Arts Institute in Trelawny, plans to bring Jamaica's reggae culture closer to the youths of western Jamaica and the world.

The school is situated on 200 acres in Flamingo Beach, Trelawny, and houses a creative arts school, a reggae village, the reggae walk of fame, among other culture-oriented avenues. According to founder and chairman of the institute, Ras Astor Black, the project has been a work in progress since 2004 having been officially approved by the Bob Marley Foundation.

He explained, "I wrote to the Bob Marley Foundation to develop a school in Bob's name and they approved of the idea. It is a total reggae experience. I want to get more Jamaicans involved in our culture so that it can be a dominant force for Jamaica's underprivileged who do not have a voice, especially in the west."

The school has not officially opened, yet already eight students are learning hands on experience at the Institute operating the Bob Arts TV, which is broadcast locally in Hanover, St James, Trelawny and St Ann. The institute will offer classes in music, film, commercials, television, advertising, voice overs, music lessons and voice lessons. As well as theatre, photography, dance, public relations, the fine arts, graphic arts, fashion designing, journalism, interior designing, radio, fiction writing, poetry and more.

Educate students

According to www.bobartsinstitute.edu the institute's foremost intent is to educate students, not only in the traditional sense of a liberal arts education, but also in a manner which fosters ideas and perceptions of their own culture and the culture of Jamaica. These ideas and perceptions will manifest themselves in the works of the students, thus shaping perceptions of current events and defining the culture of their times.

The Bob Marley School for the Arts Institute plans to distinguish itself as a commuter institution whose students reflect the economic, racial, cultural and educational diversity of contemporary Jamaica.

Ras Astor explained that the Institute is working to get accreditation through the Edna Manley College and the University of the West Indies, where students would get a degree after finishing their course of study. The compound will also house a reggae archives of Jamaican music, four stages, an arts and crafts centre, satellite up-link broadcast facility, a radio and television station as well as an on-site audio/video recording studio.

According to Ras Astor, the institute will be particularly useful to students from the western side of the island who would have previously had to travel to Kingston to pursue an education in the creative arts. "We need the influence of reggae in our lives at all times," he said.