Musician, retired cricketers among Bajans to get honorary doctorates

Three Barbadians – a musician and two cricket greats – will be among 14 “eminent persons” presented honorary degrees by The University of the West Indies (The UWI) for their outstanding contributions to regional and international development, the regional university said on Tuesday.

Musician and producer Nicholas Brancker will be conferred a Doctor of Letters (DLitt), while former West Indies cricketers Sir Cuthbert Gordon Greenidge and Desmond Leo Haynes will each receive an honorary Doctor of Laws (LLD).

Their honorary degrees will be conferred during the Cave Hill Campus graduation ceremony on October 23.

In a statement, The UWI said the 14 honorary graduands from this year will join a list of over 450 honorary degree recipients conferred by the regional university since 1965.

The UWI is retaining the annual tradition of the conferral of honorary degrees even as some of its graduations are expected to again be held virtually due to the COVID-19 pandemic, this time during the customary graduation season of October-November.

Last month, a special convocation was permitted to confer an Honorary Doctor of Science degree (DSc) on Dr Ruby Lake-Richards, one of the first 33 medical students who attended The UWI (then University College of the West Indies). Now 99 years old, she is also the first female UWI graduate from Antigua and Barbuda.

In September, another special convocation will be held for the conferral of a Doctor of Laws on Barbados’ Governor-General Dame Sandra Prunella Mason. (PR/BT)