SUBJECT: General Conference administrator overseeing Adventist Global Communication Network and Adventist World Radio, dedicates new Video Production Center.

[Warmly Greeting]
Pastor Follet is warmly greeted by beautiful young lady with flower necklace
Davis Indian youth will soon have a center to train them to meet the health needs of Amerindian villages in the jungles of Guyana. Ground was broken last month for a health sciences building on the campus of the Davis Indian Vocational School in Paruima, Guyana.

A video production center was inaugurated in an existing building on the campus of the Institute. Young people will learn how to produce videos on health, family relationships, and Gospel topics in their dialect as well as in English to share with villagers throughout the area.

The Davis Indian Vocational School served for decades as a training center for young people in the Upper Mazerouni section of Guyana. In the 1970's, government regulations resulted in the closing of this school. In 1998, the school reopened under the sponsorship of donors who are concerned about reaching the jungle villages with the Gospel. Two new buildings have
[Inspecting the troops]
VIP inspection of the Pathfinder troops
already been erected. The health sciences center will be the third building on the campus.

Local villagers donate their time and skills to fell trees, cut the logs into boards, transport them long distances through the jungle, and construct the buildings.

Today 32 young people are preparing for service by studying basic educational subjects as well as classes in how to share the Bible with others. In addition, eight adults are taking an intensive course to prepare them as Bible instructors. Some of these graduates will become lay evangelists and local church leaders.

Most of the teachers at the Institute are volunteers. A retired physician, Dr. Sheila Robertson, heads up the training program for adult Bible instructors. Short-term volunteer youth are assisting in installing a
[Video Production Center]
Video Center will produce training material in English, and the Arecuna and Akawaio dialects.
new water system. There are plans for building a small hydro-electric plant to replace the present solar panel and battery electric service.

Missionary David Gates, volunteer ADRA director for Guyana, pilots a single-engine Cessna to transport volunteers, Bible instructors, and patients between villages. A clinic in Kamarang, about a 20-minute flight from Paruima, provides medical care including limited surgical services.

Philip Follett, general vice-president of the General Conference, participated in the ground breaking and the dedication of the video production center. He commended the leaders of this project for the contribution to the physical, mental, and spiritual lives of the Amerindians which the Institute is already making, and visualized the expanded services which will be made possible by these new facilities.

Amerindians in this region learned the Gospel from Pastor Ovid Elbert Davis, who worked in Guyana from 1906 until his death from blackwater fever in 1911.

Article by Philip Follet.

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