The Tribune

GUESTS at the 49th Annual Heart Ball, held at the Sheraton Nassau Beach Resort, were excited when they heard that Sheila M. Culmer was named this year’s recipient of the Lady Sassoon Golden Heart Award. Mrs. Culmer has spent most of her life giving to others.

In presenting the Golden Heart Award to Mrs. Culmer, Chairman of the Sir Victor Sassoon (Bahamas) Heart Foundation, Mr R.E. Barnes said, “It is abundantly clear that she has always been a person who sees the challenge in front of her and works her utmost to try and rectify the wrong before her. She is a doer with a golden heart and we are all so much better for her efforts”.

Mr Barnes said the Golden Heart Award is the oldest non-governmental award of its type. This is a public award that acknowledges a person who gives of themselves selflessly for the betterment of their community. Mrs Culmer became the forty-fifth awardee of the Golden Heart Award, which was started in 1968.

In her acceptance speech, Mrs Culmer said: “Never look down at anyone unless you are stooping down to pick them up”. She said she hopes that legislation would be considered for persons with disabilities.

The honouree was born in Calabash Bay, Andros. She came to Nassau as a young child and studied at Government High School, where she excelled in her studies and also participated in Girl Guides. After graduating she had hoped to become a pediatrician or mortician, but fate had another plan. Unable to pursue higher education abroad, she accepted a student teaching post at Western Junior School. She accepted the challenge of teaching students that other teachers did not want in their classes.

In 1967, Mrs Culmer graduated from the Bahamas Teachers College. She taught at Sayles and William Phipps Primary School and volunteered at the Ranfurly Home for Children. Dr Corolyn Hanna recognised that Sheila had a special ability for working with children with learning disabilities, as well as the disadvantaged. Consequently, Dr Hanna recommended that Sheila be sent to complete the Special Education Course offered in Jamaica at the University of the West Indies. Upon her return in 1971, Mrs Culmer was seconded to Stapledon School for the mentally retarded. Overtime, this would become her lifelong goal, to assist the mentally and physically challenged.

While teaching at the Stapledon School for the mentally retarded she fought for her students to help them achieve their goals in life. She taught at Stapledon until 1979 when she became principal of the school until 1996. There she advocated for and achieved free education for the mentally retarded at the school.

Mrs Culmer is an advocate and trailblazer for many. She worked with William Hawkins to help form the first Special Olympics in Nassau. She was inspired by Sandy Manning, who had worked on Special Olympics in Grand Bahama. Mrs Culmer became the first national director for Special Olympics in the Bahamas. In 1989 she organised and helped to host the first Caribbean Regional Track and Field Games for persons who were classified as mentally retarded. The Bahamas was the first Caribbean country to host these regional track and field games with attendees from seventeen countries.

Mrs Culmer chaired the conference committee to address legislation for the disabled. In 1996 she chaired the Bahamas National Conference on Disability. She was the chief advocate and proponent for persons with disabilities to participate in the Bahamas Games. She also organised and secured parties, especially at Christmas time for the disabled and underprivileged.

Sheila Culmer continued her advocacy and was instrumental in obtaining the present Bahamas National Council for Disability headquarters from the Bahamas Government.

When Mrs Culmer formally retired it did not mean that she stopped working for those less fortunate. In 2009 she co-chaired and partnered with Adventure Unlimited Bahamas to present ‘Blind Challenge’, which involved a blind man navigating Nassau Harbour. Her involvement in assisting the mentally and physically challenged continued.

Internationally, Mrs Culmer has been involved with the US National Association of Elementary School Principals, the National Alliance of Black School Educators, the Council for Exceptional Children, the Council for Administrators of Special Educators and also the Society for Accessible Travel and Hospitality (SATH).