Dr LENNOX ROWE of ST. ELIZABETH : Poor boy with no food and shoes rises to the top to become Doctor

BY INGRID BROWN Associate Editor - Special Assignment browni@jamaicaobserver.com  Sunday, August 02, 2015 

GROWING up with his grandmother in rural St Elizabeth, Lennox Rowe could not attend school more than three days a week as he had to stay home to work in the field and accompany the elderly woman to the market.

Dr Lennox Rowe graduating from NCU in 2013 with a
doctorate in education. (PHOTOS: GREGORY BENNETT)

But despite his poor attendance at primary school and sometimes going to bed without dinner, Rowe not only passed the Common Entrance examinations to gain a place at Munro College, but has risen from being a poor boy with only one pair of uniform and no shoes to having a doctorate in education.

"I never dreamt that one day Lennox Rowe would have a doctorate in front of my name, and I am so humbled by this accomplishment," said Dr Rowe, who is getting ready to pen his biography which he intends to title From Poverty to PhD.

Rowe, an advance chemistry teacher at Nassau Christian Academy in The Bahamas, said failure was not an option as he knew the only way out of poverty would be education, since he had no hope of an inheritance.

"Because of the condition in which I grew up, there was always a drive to ensure that I would never continue like this and I recognised the importance of education as social mobility," Rowe said.

His journey began in the deep rural community of Bantin in Mountainside when his mother gave him to his paternal grandmother, despite his father not initially acknowledging him as his son. According to Rowe, his father had given his mother the wrong information, resulting in him being registered in a different name.

Rowe said he grew up thinking his mother did not want him, and with his father providing only a small stipend towards his upkeep, his grandmother had to work hard, making and selling woven baskets and mats, to make ends meet for both of them.

Life was tough, as they lived in a one-room house. But his grandmother loved him as if he were her own son.

As the only child in the home, he had to help with the chores from

an early age; this included

plaiting straws to make the craft items for sale.

Owning only one pair of uniform and needing to help the elderly woman with everything around the home, Rowe said he would only get to go to school three days of the week. more