In the 1930s many children in Bermuda left school as young as thirteen. Born in 1939, Mrs. Shirley L. T. Pearman knew from the earliest age she would go beyond the norm and pursue further education. “Nobody told me, “She explains, “but I knew it would happen.” However, she couldn’t know she would give her life to allowing others to pursue their education in the visual arts and eventually receive many awards, including the Sandys Rotary Most Outstanding Teacher Award in 1995 and an MBE in 2012 for her major contributions to the arts and education, as well as to community and cultural activities in Bermuda.
Her early awareness of the importance of education was thanks to the profound influence of her parents, Mrs. Rosalind Robinson and Dr. Kenneth Robinson, who at different stages were both Principals of Francis Patton School. Her father had also been Principal of Harrington Sound School and eventually became Chief Education Officer. During much of her childhood she was aware of his studying for his Masters and Ph.D. at Harvard. Her mother would say she had three children: Shirley, her husband’s doctorate, and Kenneth Robinson, born when Shirley was 10. Shirley herself loved literature, history and social studies but her greatest passion was art, a passion that her parents helped her cultivate by introducing her to their artistic friends. Aged 12, she would accompany her father to the openings of art societies and galleries. In the early 1950s she attended Saturday painting classes with sculptor Billee Lang. A student at the Berkeley Institute, Shirley opted to take art rather than Latin. Her teacher was Charles Lloyd Tucker whom she describes as a teacher for art students. A friend who found his classes difficult because she was not naturally artistic made Shirley conscious of encouraging all children to enjoy art.
At the end of one term a friend gained 98 per cent for Latin; Shirley gained 98 per cent for Art. But whereas her friend’s result was factored into her overall average, Shirley’s was not, giving her a first-hand experience of the injustice that can happen to young people who want to pursue the Arts. Shirley finished her high school education at Alma Ladies College in St. Thomas, Ontario where she completed Grades 12 and 13 and went on to Mount Allison, gaining a Bachelor of Fine Arts. Back in Bermuda, she had her own art studio, and she also had her first employment – teacher of art at Prospect Secondary School for Girls which had amalgamated with the Girls’ Institute of Arts and Crafts. Not all excellent artists can teach but Shirley soon realised that she was meant to be a teacher. Students congratulated her on her patience. “Prospect gave me the cement,” she explains. “It was a perfect environment for teaching art.”
A strong proponent of teacher training, her father was adamant she should receive that qualification. By this time, she was married to Roderick Pearman, and the young couple went off to New York University to earn their degrees. Shirley studied for her Master’s in education, specialising in art. ‘It was a fantastic experience,” she says, “because it helped me use art to tap into the inner core of young people.” She came back to Bermuda with a mission to push the arts because she could see so clearly what they could do for children. Teaching first at Sandys Secondary as a substitute for a friend, she then taught at West End Primary, enjoying the experience of introducing young children to art, making sure they were exposed to art galleries. But wanting the challenge of taking students to GCE levels, she moved to Warwick Secondary in 1974. She has fond memories of many students several of whom would become teachers themselves. It is special that one of her students, Carol-Ann Furbert, also a student of Shirley’s parents, is here tonight to receive an award.
Retiring from Warwick Secondary in 1997, Shirley did not take up a life of leisure. Instead, she has taken voluntary positions on boards and committees so numerous it would be impossible to list them all. Ones particularly dear to her heart are the Bermuda Arts Council, which she has chaired, the Bermuda Historical Society, the Emancipation Committee, The Lost-at-Sea Monument Memorial Committee; and the Bermuda National Gallery. Shirley’s father’s groundbreaking work, Heritage, has proved an invaluable resource for discovering information about Bermudians fit to be heroes. In 2001 Shirley embraced the opportunity to participate in the Bermuda Connections programme in the Smithsonian Folklife Festival, held in Washington in 2001 and Bermuda in 2002. Shirley had the formidable task of creating children’s arts and crafts activities to complement subjects such as farming and boatbuilding being discussed and demonstrated. “The Festival,” she says, “empowered Bermudians to say, “Yes, we do have a culture.” It also inspired her to create an education kit on Bermuda’s culture for teachers and to write Hands On!, Bermuda’s first compilation of children’s and adults’ crafts and games played in Bermuda, which includes personal narratives, and which is soon to be published.
Shirley recalls Robert Frost’s famous lines quoted in her Mount Allison yearbook:
“These woods are lovely, dark and deep
But I have promises to keep
And miles to go before I sleep.”
She remembers looking forward to her career journey after graduating. Now she looks back. And we agree with her when she says, “I have kept those promises.”
