INAUGURATION IN MACAU: St. Paul's New Building

  

 St Paul’s School yesterday inaugurated its new “Bishop Domingos Lam Memorial Building”. The school’s principal, Alejandro Salcedo, declared: “A new school building does not just happen. It takes months of planning and organization, optimism and perseverance, and unfortunately, some frustration also.” He thanked the Education Department and the Macau Foundation for providing the MOP 56,796,000 and MOP
37,660,000 funding respectively.
“I must say that without your funding this project would not have seen the light.” The new building comprises
five floors, where classrooms for the youngest students of the kindergarten section as well as for the high school
pupils are located. These include laboratories, communitarian rooms, where the students can do homework
on their “tablet pcs”, and craft corners for the youngest.
St Paul’s School is a diocesan school run by the Dominican fathers, which according to the director, Mr Salcedo, provides “the beautiful experience of a Catholic education”. The director also explained that the school is committed to “modern teaching and learning for the twenty-first century” and will therefore certainly be aided by the new building’s facilities. “We are proud of our past but it is a must for us to detach ourselves from it and embark on a new educational dimension”, he stated, adding: “St Paul’s School is well known for the immersion of technology in our educational programs. However, for us to “tech” or not to “tech” education is not the question. The real question and the real aim for us is to harvest the power of technology to meet the challenges of the 21st century and make education relevant, responsive, and effective for anyone, anywhere, anytime.”
Mr Salcedo then revealed the reason behind the name of the building. “Bishop Domingos Lam was one of a kind. I was very close to him and if I had to describe him I would say that he was an ascetic, joyful, wise, actively involved with the physical and spiritual welfare of his people, and he was a dedicated and effective teacher. Bishop Lam was very fond of St Paul’s School. On many occasions he used to drop by or call just to see how we were doing.”
Chief Executive Chui Sai On attended the ceremony and after the inauguration, the Secretary for Social
Affairs and Culture, Mr Cheong U and the DSEJ director Ms Leong Lai, were given a tour of the new building.