UG’s 1st female Vice-Chancellor, Prof. Paloma Mohamed Martin, is a ‘Special Person’

Apr 03, 2022 News

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Leading the charge of Guyana’s National University…

“Stay close to God and to those who love you. Challenges are opportunities embedded in life. Know that perfection will never be attained but excellence will imitate it, so go for excellence and learn from failure. Always try to act from a place of love. Integrity matters.”

By Rehanna Ramsay

Kaieteur News – This year, the theme of International Women’s Day (IWD) was breaking the bias. Though IWD is observed on March 8 annually, every day is worth celebrating the women and girls who challenge the stereotypes and find the courage to break the proverbial glass ceiling.

This week’s Kaieteur News’s ‘Special Person’, Professor Paloma Mohamed Martin Ph.D., falls into that exact category. Prof. Mohamed Martin is the first female Vice-Chancellor (VC) of the University of Guyana (UG), the nation’s apex tertiary institution. She has perhaps been challenging stereotypes since she could walk—having been enrolled in school at about the age of one.
In fact, in her capacity as VC, Prof. Mohamed Martin is also the first woman to be appointed Vice -Chancellor at any university in the Anglo-phone Caribbean.
Her role at UG requires inter alia, oversight of an institution that facilitates studies for approximately 11,000 students, employs 1000 staff, and has eight campuses with hundreds of partners and associates. This is even as she responds to state and other interests.
Reflecting on her journey from where she now sits, Prof. Mohamed Martin told Kaieteur News emphatically “…I don’t feel special. I feel blessed to be able to do what I do.”
Prof. Mohamed Martin had returned to Guyana in 2007 only for a brief spell but stayed for 15 years. She has led the University of Guyana’s Transitional Management Committee as its Second Chair since August 2019. She has also been Deputy Vice-Chancellor for UG’s Philanthropy, Alumni, and Civic Engagement PACE department which she founded in 2016.As explained in her brief bio, UG’s 11th Vice-Chancellor has worked on several multi-million dollar multi-university research projects and has been highly successful in resource fundraising for UG, having developed specialties in strategic energy issues, complex analysis, and high-level negotiation. As a result, she has been awarded two Presidential Medals in 2012 and in 2015 as well as A City of New York Award for Culture in 2013.

In 2014, Prof. Mohamed Martin was named by the US Embassy in Guyana among the top five most influential women in the country. The following year, she became the first woman Caribbean Laureate for Excellence in Arts and Letters, which is considered the Nobel Prize of the Caribbean.
In addition, Prof. Mohamed- Martin has authored over 20 books and produced 15 films. Amongst many other regional and international bodies, she is a member of the Caribbean Examinations Council (CXC) and also an Executive Board member of CARICOM’s Council for Social and Human Development (COSHoD).
To her students, she is a beloved Professor and Humanist. Many of her peers and loved ones referred to her as a “servant leader” and a “titanium butterfly,” because of her strong yet sociable persona.
EARLY INFLUENCES
It is likely Prof. Mohamed Martin developed those attributes from being born into a household of three younger siblings – all boys.
She told Kaieteur News that her parents were divorced by the time she was eight years old. She explained that her mother, Marie Mohamed, a prominent nursery school teacher, worked outside the home for most of their lives and, as a result, she was left to care for her younger siblings.
Prof. Mohamed Martin stated, “After my parents divorced, I basically assumed the role of mother for my younger siblings, because my mother was always very busy with work, taking care of other people’s children, so I was taking care of my brothers [twin] since they were about a year old. I took them to school and basically looked after them for a long time.”
The VC recalled that having a mother who was absorbed in her work as a teacher, fairly influenced her professionally. She said that because of how her mother sacrificially worked to ensure her students were taken care of, often sharing the little the family had to help other children; she strongly resisted the urge to follow in her footsteps.

“As I said before my mother was extremely busy either helping other people’s children or raising funds for the schools she worked at; it is what basically absorbed her life …I never wanted that to be me, so I ran from teaching, I never wanted to teach, but when I got into it I started to do basically the same things. I understood why my mother was the way she was and I ended up loving it,” she added.
But before she could venture into a career as a beloved professor, Prof. Paloma-Mohamed recalled her first job was in broadcasting.
She was about 16 years old and had just completed her high school education at Queen’s College when she landed the coveted role of broadcaster/producer at the national radio station – Guyana Broadcasting Corporation (GBC).
By then, she had already moved from her family’s William Street, Kitty, Georgetown home, and went to live with her aunt Dorothy and uncle Loris Smartt in Subryanville, Kitty.
The VC noted that the move was significant since it was caused by the fact that the family lived next door to a known pedophile. “We had a known pedophile who moved in next door so the move was to keep me out of harm’s way,” she said.
This she noted, “…informed my own sense of social justice and protection of the vulnerable. All my life people have protected me. I have been blessed.”
ACADEMIC THRUST
Under the watchful eyes of her various “moms”, the young Mohamed Martin was always urged to take her academics seriously. “I remember after I got my first job, my mother insisted that I go to university. I think that changed my trajectory significantly and doubled my chances of becoming Vice-Chancellor because to be Vice-Chancellor you must have a strong academic background,” she said, emphasising that she went to school at a very early age.

“I think I was around one (year-old) when I went to teacher Tina’s pre-school. Then I went to the Holy Mary Catholic School and then Rama Krishna Primary. I spent two years at North Georgetown and at Queen’s College where I did both ‘O’ level and ‘A’ levels. I did my undergraduate at UG, postgraduate in Communications at Harvard, PhD from UWI Behavioural Science—where I did my Dissertation on Power and Change. I completed my post-doctorate work at the Centre for Addictions and Mental Health in Canada.”
To this end, Prof. Mohamed Martin is convinced that when it comes to her career she did not choose it, it chose her. She explained that after completing her studies, she was headed to work with the United Nations (UN) or one of the international institutions.
However, a detour brought her back to Guyana in 2007. It was supposed to be only for three months but as fate would have it, 15 years later, she is still here.
“I started to teach some students at UG who had been waiting to graduate…One thing led to another. Fifteen years later, I am still here, doing the same thing in different ways,” she shared.
Even as she accepted her role in the academic world, Prof. Mohamed Martin said that she did not realise, at first, that it was preparing her for something much bigger – her role as VC.
For her, it was not an ambition not even a profession, but a mission. She asserted, nonetheless, that “becoming Vice-Chancellor or even first female Vice-Chancellor was not a path that I consciously took. I was reluctant.” And like the biblical figure Jonah, she said, “I tried everything to escape but…I was brought back to it every time.”
“I didn’t consider being VC at all, but in late 2019, I was convinced by several individuals that I had to give it a shot. And when I considered the consequences of not doing it, I knew…it was not going to be about me. It was about stabilising UG which is of such strategic importance to our beloved country,” Prof. Mohamed Martin related.
BREAKING THE MOULD
According to Prof. Mohamed Martin, once she decided to take the course, the process was 12 months, and “long treacherous, exceptionally rigorous and brutally competitive.”
“I was competing against three well-respected and much older men. I was younger by about 25 years on average and I was a woman, I had no female peer or predecessor, no special sponsor that I knew of, only the overwhelming support of the university and significant numbers of people who knew I would do my best out of my love for UG and because I had been doing that for over a decade.”
On top of that, two days before she began her first interviews for the VC job, Prof. Mohamed Martin faced a tragedy in the family; her sister-in-law died and left her three small children behind. Naturally, Prof. Mohamed Martin, already a mother of three (one biological and two adopted), assumed responsibility for the other children.
But despite the challenges, Prof. Mohamed Martin was successful in her quest, and in June of 2020, she was appointed as the 11th VC of UG, ending a year-long process and breaking the institution’s 57 years mould of having mainly foreign males occupy that position since UG became operationalised in 1963.
OPERATION BLUEPRINT
Today, Prof. Mohamed Martin is increasingly focused on operationalising UG’s Blueprint 2040. This is a 20-year transformational plan which she spearheaded. She explained that Blueprint 2040 was created to ensure the institution meets the challenges that would face Guyana and the planet over the next 20 years.
According to the VC, UG’s 2040 Blueprint is structured in four, five-year phases and four overarching aspirational goals.
“We are in phase one now – 2020-2025…the aspirational goals are: (1) to produce at least one graduate per household, (2) to be a world leader in specific disciplines, techniques, and technologies whether in agriculture and aquaculture, energy, entrepreneurship, climate, and other sectors, (3) for (UG) to be a centre of excellence in research and policy responses to Guyana’s grand challenges, (4) to be an institution fit for rapid evolution and that is future-focused,” she explained.
At present, she said, her focus is on “staff and student-citizen success and resourcing the under-nourished university, building the IDCE and Berbice Campuses, apart from dealing with the massive challenge of COVID-19 and putting the old paper-based, chalk and talk university,” online rapidly.
Prof. Mohamed Martin told Kaieteur News that her role as VC, though highly impactful and rewarding, is gruelling and typically calls for long days.
She explained that “ the VC is expected to be everything, to everyone at any time… I usually work till 2am on any day; some days later… There are days of back-to-back meetings with sometimes external visiting delegations, early morning debriefing with different staff members, working on the various change projects going on now to meet our targets in the first phase of our Blueprint. Inspections, approvals, mediations, planning, budget processes, leading young projects, fundraising, technical support…speaking engagements and teaching every once in a while are all part of my routine.”
Outside of her very busy schedule, Prof. Mohamed Martin still tries to cook at least one meal a day for her family.
She said, “I try to cook most nights or early in the morning and take the kids to school since it’s the only time they might get to see me for the day. So, I try to at least do that.”
STAYING MOTIVATED
Speaking about motivation, Prof. Mohamed Martin said, “what brings me joy and keeps me focused is that I know every day I can be part of a team and a great tradition of changing lives for the better… And knowing that what I do every day matters to many, many people. So, I must get up. I get up and try to stay focused.”
Even so, Prof. Mohamed Martin revealed that her career remains mission-directed. She added, “I never really know what I will need to do next but I always know when I get to it, I will be able to handle it.”
Continuing, she said, “What I’d really like to see is those institutions that I care about, work for, and which matter in this country, really thrive in the near future. And then I would like to retire gracefully while I still am well enough to enjoy it.”
The VC underscored the fact that her life has been filled with generosity and love from many people – “all kinds of people and I am very thankful for this—eternally so.”
“So, if anything, I am returning what was poured into me by others. This is what I think is powerful about where I am now and what that enables me to influence,” she said.
The VC is quite optimistic about the future; she looks forward to it and everything that she still hopes to accomplish. In the meantime, her advice to women in similar leadership roles is to be positive, kind, good listeners and fearless communicators, when necessary.
She noted that while being a woman is wonderful, being human is better because all people matter. “Be like a proton –always positive!” she said, adding that “find your centre and do what helps you to stay there is key.”
She advises, “Stay close to God and to those who love you. Challenges are opportunities embedded in life. Know that perfection will never be attained but excellence will imitate it, so go for excellence and learn from failure. Always try to act from a place of love. Integrity matters.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

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