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  • UWI Five Islands and Antigua Bar Association partner to expand legal training

    UWI Five Islands and Antigua Bar Association partner to expand legal training

    Legal education in Antigua and Barbuda is set to receive a major boost following a landmark new partnership between the University of the West Indies Five Islands Campus (UWI FIC) and the Antigua and Barbuda Bar Association. The collaboration, formalized via a signed Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) hosted at the Five Islands Campus, aims to expand access to hands-on professional development and real-world learning experiences for emerging law students at the institution.

    Senior stakeholders from both organizations gathered for the official signing ceremony, including Pro Vice-Chancellor and UWI FIC Principal Professor C. Justin Robinson, Assistant Lecturer Jenna Dicocco from the campus’ School of Humanities & Education, Antigua and Barbuda Bar Association President Luann De Costa, and legal sector representative George Looby.

    Professor Robinson emphasized that the agreement arrives at a critical juncture for the campus, which is currently rolling out its new Bachelor of Laws (LLB) programme. The programme has already drawn strong interest, receiving applications from prospective students across Antigua and Barbuda as well as the broader Organization of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) region.

    “Our goal extends far beyond simply granting students access to a law qualification,” Robinson explained during the event. “We want our learners to develop rigorous research skills and build advocacy expertise centered on the pressing legal issues that impact our own local jurisdiction.”

    For her part, De Costa underscored that the Bar Association intends to take an active, hands-on role in shaping the growth and direction of the new LLB programme, rather than acting as a passive third party. “We are here to be genuine partners in this initiative, not just observers,” De Costa stated. “That commitment covers everything from contributing to curriculum design to one-on-one student mentoring, and supporting students as they work to launch a dedicated student law society and peer-led law journal.”

    The MOU outlines a range of concrete collaborative initiatives between the two institutions. A new structured mentorship scheme will connect participating students with seasoned practicing attorneys from the Bar Association’s membership. The partners will also co-host regular workshops focused on pressing legal topics that deliver tangible benefits to both learners and sector employees.

    Additionally, the Antigua and Barbuda Bar Association will help promote and facilitate internship placements for UWI FIC law students at its member law firms and affiliated legal organizations. In exchange, the university campus will host ongoing Continuing Legal Education (CLE) sessions led by active practicing attorneys, allowing local legal professionals to maintain and update their professional credentials.

    To further connect emerging and established legal professionals, the partnership will also include regular joint networking events that give students direct access to members of Antigua and Barbuda’s wider legal community.

    In a post-ceremony press statement, UWI FIC noted that the new partnership reflects a shared dedication between both institutions to properly prepare the next generation of legal practitioners for work within the Commonwealth Caribbean legal system, while forging deeper, more collaborative ties between the national academic sector and the local legal profession.

  • Grenlec opens 2026 Debates Season

    Grenlec opens 2026 Debates Season

    One of the Caribbean’s longest-running youth debating competitions is poised to launch its 2026 season, with 18 secondary school teams across Grenada already deep in preparations for the opening preliminary round scheduled to launch later this month.

    To set participating students and their coaching staff up for success, a mandatory orientation and skills-building workshop was held on Friday, September 4, ahead of the competition’s official start. The full-day training session centered on building core competencies critical to competitive debating success, with targeted modules covering impromptu debate strategy, rigorous research methods, structured argument development, and polished public presentation techniques. Beyond skill-building, the workshop also created a collaborative space for teams to raise clarifying questions about competition rules, logistics, and judging criteria, resolving any uncertainty ahead of the qualifying rounds.

    Organized and sponsored by Grenlec, the annual initiative has built a 18-year legacy of empowering young people since its launch in 2008. In a statement ahead of the new season, company representatives expressed sincere gratitude for the enduring cross-sector collaboration that has kept the program running for nearly two decades. The initiative relies on ongoing partnerships with participating secondary schools, classroom educators, family supporters, participating students themselves, and stakeholders from both the private and public sectors to deliver the program to young debaters each year.

    Unlike many youth competitions that focus on narrow academic topics, the Grenlec Debates are designed to push students to engage with real-world issues. Participants are challenged to research, refine, and articulate diverse perspectives on pressing topics that impact both local Grenadian communities and global society at large, fostering critical thinking and civic engagement from a young age.

    The 2026 Preliminary Round is set to officially get underway on September 21, with advancing teams moving on to later rounds of the competition in the coming months. This story was distributed via NOW Grenada, which notes that it holds no responsibility for opinions or statements shared in contributed content, and provides a channel for users to report abusive content if encountered.

  • The UWI Five Islands Campus and Bar Association Sign MOU

    The UWI Five Islands Campus and Bar Association Sign MOU

    A landmark partnership agreement between The University of the West Indies (The UWI) Five Islands Campus and the Antigua and Barbuda Bar Association was formalized last week at a signing ceremony hosted on the Antigua-based campus, marking a major step forward for legal education in the Eastern Caribbean. The event brought together key institutional stakeholders, including Pro Vice-Chancellor and Campus Principal Professor C. Justin Robinson, Assistant Lecturer Jenna Dicocco from the School of Humanities & Education, Antigua and Barbuda Bar Association President Luann De Costa, and local legal representative George Looby.

    Opening the ceremony, Professor Robinson emphasized that the timing of the new Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) could not be better, coming alongside the official launch of the campus’s new Bachelor of Laws (LLB) programme. The programme has already seen strong demand from prospective students across Antigua and Barbuda and the wider Organization of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) region. He underlined that the partnership goes far beyond simply expanding access to a qualifying law degree for regional students. Instead, the shared goal is to empower the next generation of Caribbean legal professionals to conduct original research and build advocacy capacity around the pressing local legal challenges that shape life across the region’s jurisdictions.

    De Costa echoed Robinson’s vision, reaffirming the Bar Association’s commitment to long-term, active collaboration rather than passive involvement in the programme. “We’re here to be a real partner in this, not just observers,” she stated. Outlining the core areas of collaboration, she shared that the association will contribute directly to curriculum development to ensure the programme aligns with local practice needs, deliver one-on-one mentorship for enrolled students, and support student-led initiatives including the establishment of a campus law society and an academic student law journal.

    According to The UWI Five Islands Institutional Communications (FIC), the partnership embodies a shared commitment between the two institutions: to train emerging legal professionals to practice competently within the Commonwealth Caribbean’s unique legal framework, while also strengthening productive ties between the academic campus and the local practicing legal community.

    Established in 2019 as the fifth official campus of The UWI, The UWI Five Islands Campus represents a historic milestone for higher education access across the Eastern Caribbean. Situated in Antigua and Barbuda, the campus brings the UWI’s globally recognized academic excellence directly to the heart of the Caribbean region. As part of the broader UWI system, which holds consistent top rankings in the Times Higher Education (THE) World University Rankings, the campus adheres to the same rigorous academic standards that have made the UWI a leading beacon of educational achievement across the Caribbean for decades.

    Today, the campus offers more than 45 accredited undergraduate and postgraduate degree programmes across four core academic schools: the School of Humanities and Education, the School of Business and Management, the School of Health and Behavioural Sciences, and the School of Science, Computing and Artificial Intelligence. It also hosts the regional Centre of Excellence for Oceanography and the Blue Economy (COBE), an institution dedicated to advancing cutting-edge marine science research and driving sustainable ocean-focused economic development – two priorities that are critical to the economic and environmental resilience of Caribbean small island developing states. More information about the campus and its programmes can be found at its official website: www.fiveislands.uwi.edu.

  • Dominican Republic students post low scores in math, reading and science

    Dominican Republic students post low scores in math, reading and science

    The latest 2025 round of the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), released Tuesday, has laid bare persistent academic gaps for 15-year-old students in the Dominican Republic, with performance in mathematics, reading, and science remaining well below Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) averages and stagnant since the 2022 assessment cycle.

    The standardized global assessment, which benchmarks student proficiency across 91 participating countries and economies, recorded average scores of 339 in mathematics, 346 in reading, and 361 in science for Dominican test-takers. All three figures fall significantly short of the collective average posted by OECD member nations.

    A closer look at proficiency levels reveals the depth of the challenge facing the Dominican education system. Just 9% of Dominican 15-year-olds reached at least the baseline proficiency threshold in mathematics, a stark contrast to the 65% average across OECD countries. In reading, only 23% of Dominican students hit or exceeded the basic proficiency mark, compared to 69% among their OECD peers. For science, that share stands at 26%, versus 74% across participating OECD nations.

    Most notably, the report found that nearly no Dominican students achieved the highest tiers of proficiency in any of the three tested subjects. For comparison, the OECD average of top-performing students is 8% in mathematics, 7% in science, and 6% in reading.

    Beyond overall performance gaps, the PISA analysis identified two key contributing factors: socioeconomic disparities and elevated rates of school bullying. The assessment confirmed a clear performance divide tied to students’ socioeconomic backgrounds: Dominican students from the top 25% of socioeconomic households outscored peers from the bottom 25% by 69 points in science alone. While this gap is substantial, it is actually narrower than the 85-point average socioeconomic performance gap recorded across OECD countries.

    On school climate, the report raised particular alarm about bullying prevalence in the Dominican Republic. Thirty-seven percent of surveyed Dominican students reported experiencing at least one form of bullying multiple times per month or more, a figure 7 percentage points higher than the OECD average of 20%.

    As one of the most comprehensive global studies of secondary school student performance, the 2025 PISA assessment tested more than 760,000 15-year-old students across all participating regions. The data is designed to provide policymakers with internationally comparable insights into education system performance, learning outcomes, and contextual factors shaping student success.

  • Dominican Republic announces 4,000 english scholarships for tourism workers

    Dominican Republic announces 4,000 english scholarships for tourism workers

    In a move designed to bolster the Dominican Republic’s flagship tourism industry and create new professional pathways for its existing workforce, the nation’s Ministry of Higher Education, Science and Technology (MESCyT) has announced a new round of 4,000 English-language scholarships exclusively for tourism sector employees. This initiative follows an overwhelming response to an initial scholarship round, which was fully claimed by eligible workers in under two hours, signaling massive unmet demand for accessible, career-focused language training.

    MESCyT head Rafael Santos Badía explained that the program was developed in direct response to widespread calls from tourism workers for professional upskilling opportunities, with a specific focus on flexible virtual English courses tailored to boost employability in the global tourism landscape. The new scholarship cohort will be split evenly: 2,000 spots will be distributed through the Association of Hotels and Tourism Companies (Asonahores), the leading industry trade group, while the remaining 2,000 will be reserved for workers in emerging, fast-growing tourism destinations across the country.

    Beyond language training, Santos Badía outlined a broader strategic push to develop local leadership capacity in the tourism sector, noting that strengthening national human capital is critical to ensuring Dominican workers share in the economic gains of the industry’s ongoing expansion. To that end, the ministry is also developing new management training programs designed to increase Dominican representation in the middle and senior leadership roles that are currently disproportionately held by foreign hires in many large hotel properties.

    Aguie Lendor, vice president of Asonahores, praised the public-private partnership behind the scholarship initiative, calling it a transformative step toward full professionalization of the country’s tourism workforce. She emphasized that accessible language and leadership training are dual key tools: they not only open up higher-wage career advancement opportunities for frontline workers, but also help the Dominican tourism sector maintain its competitive edge in a crowded global travel market.

    Ultimately, the program aims to deliver dual benefits: it will help tourism employees sharpen their cross-cultural communication skills, improve overall service quality, and better meet the expectations of the millions of international visitors that flock to the Dominican Republic each year. That includes travelers from the United States, the country’s largest source market for international tourism.

  • Tekort aan co-schapsplaatsen zet artsenopleiding onder druk

    Tekort aan co-schapsplaatsen zet artsenopleiding onder druk

    A new joint analysis from Suriname’s Faculty of Social and Health Sciences (FMeW) has sounded the alarm over a rapidly worsening bottleneck in the clinical training stage of the country’s medical education programs, a gap that threatens training quality and student outcomes if left unaddressed.

    Currently, data shows the faculty only has between 30 and 40 available clinical placement (co-schap) spots for trainee doctors. To make matters worse, 79 trainees are already active in placements across the system, with an additional 24 candidates still waiting for an open position to become available. This existing backlog is only the start of the challenge: a far larger cohort of undergraduate medical students is currently progressing through their pre-clinical coursework and will soon require clinical placements of their own.

    FMeW officials warn that expanding overall admission numbers for medical degrees without simultaneously expanding the available capacity for clinical training will only create cascading problems down the line. These risks include extended waiting periods for aspiring trainee doctors, measurable declines in training quality that put patient care at risk, and growing demotivation among students stuck in prolonged backlogs.

    A breakdown of future demand makes the scale of the gap clear. Around 96 students from the existing doctoral/BIII training pathway are still waiting to move into clinical placements. Over the coming years, an estimated 90 additional students from the new bachelor-master curriculum track will also reach the point where they need clinical training. This adds up to a potential total of 186 future students requiring placements, even if the full cohort does not need spots at the exact same time.

    Unlike pre-clinical coursework that can be expanded through online learning or larger lecture halls, clinical placement capacity cannot grow indefinitely without targeted investment and systemic change. During the clinical phase, trainees must gain hands-on experience delivering direct patient care under the close supervision of experienced medical professionals. This requires sufficient access to hospital departments, qualified supervisor time, steady patient volumes, and structured learning spaces that are already stretched thin across the current system.

    To address the growing crisis, FMeW has put forward a series of targeted policy recommendations. The core proposal is to expand the national clinical training network beyond the existing hub at the Academic Hospital Paramaribo, by formally integrating other hospitals and independent care institutions into the training system. Additional recommendations include increased public and institutional investment in hiring and training more clinical supervisors, expanding access to simulation-based medical education to supplement hands-on training, and implementing digital planning tools to streamline placement allocation and reduce administrative backlogs.

    The landmark analysis was compiled by a cross-institutional team led by FMeW Dean Fitzgerald Gopie, Vincent Lumsden, chair of the national Specialists Registration Committee, and former Director of the Suriname Health Fund Rick Kromodihardjo. The study emphasizes that any public debate about appropriate medical student admission numbers cannot be separated from discussions of clinical training capacity. Allowing more students into medical programs at the entry level without creating additional space for clinical training, the authors conclude, does not solve the country’s need for more qualified doctors — it simply shifts the crisis to a later stage of training, where it will create more harmful consequences for students and patients alike.

  • LUCELEC-backed scholar aiming higher after SPISE experience

    LUCELEC-backed scholar aiming higher after SPISE experience

    For promising young Saint Lucian STEM enthusiast Anaiah Bousquet, a summer spent at the Student Programme for Innovation in Science and Engineering (SPISE) has been far more than a five-week academic crash course. It has reshaped her perspective on her career, expanded her professional boundaries, and given her newfound confidence to chase ambitious goals that will benefit her home region.

    A recent graduate of St Joseph’s Convent, Bousquet is one of the 2024 cohort’s two Saint Lucian SPISE participants, supported by a full scholarship from St Lucia Electricity Services Limited (LUCELEC) that will carry through to her 2026 university enrollment. This year’s intensive residential STEM initiative was hosted at the University of the West Indies (UWI) Cave Hill Campus in Barbados, bringing together top young talent from across the Caribbean.

    LUCELEC’s long-standing commitment to nurturing local STEM leadership has stretched more than 13 years, with the utility company awarding an annual SPISE scholarship to high-achieving Saint Lucian students seeking access to this elite regional programme. For Bousquet, the experience balanced intense academic challenge with engaging, collaborative work that opened new doors. “It was a very rigorous but entertaining experience,” she explained of the programme, which introduced her to cutting-edge concepts while connecting her to a network of like-minded young STEM lovers from every corner of the Caribbean.

    Throughout the programme, university recruitment officers encouraged participants to look beyond regional higher education options and frame their academic journeys as investments in the Caribbean’s long-term development. For Bousquet, that message landed deeply. “Being around others who enjoy STEM and who come from many different backgrounds has certainly prepared me for university and further education,” she noted. “SPISE has allowed me to think bigger and to have higher aspirations.”

    Bousquet emphasized that LUCELEC’s sponsorship was far more than financial support—it was a vote of confidence that made the entire experience possible. “For me, having a company such as this sponsoring me was a very big deal,” she said. “To have a company that focuses so much on youth development in our country really means a lot, and it really enhanced my belief in myself and allowed me to perform my best at SPISE.”

    Beyond the impact on her own journey, Bousquet says the scholarship sends a critical message to other young Saint Lucians facing financial barriers to advanced learning. “Oftentimes, for economic reasons, people are not always able to go into all the programmes or the courses they would like, but it shows that there are companies like LUCELEC that are willing to support you throughout your journey,” she explained. That visibility makes elite STEM opportunities feel attainable for a new generation of local students.

    Bousquet also argues that collaborative regional STEM programmes like SPISE are foundational to growth for both individual Caribbean nations and the bloc as a whole. A key benefit, she notes, is the access to hands-on practical learning that fills gaps in traditional secondary education. “One of my challenges in STEM was getting practical experience, because oftentimes in school, we learn a lot of theory, but it is difficult to get hands-on experience with the areas of study,” she said. “So, the way I overcome this is by enrolling in many practical courses such as SPISE…. I would certainly aim to do more of these in the future.”
    Bousquet’s track record—including a gold medal at the Caribbean Science Foundation’s annual Mathematics Olympiad and her standout performance at SPISE—speaks to her relentless dedication to advancing her STEM skills. Looking ahead, she plans to pursue a career as a chemical engineer, with a focus on solving one of the Caribbean’s most pressing challenges: improving regional food security. “This is something I am very passionate about as it combines my interest in food and in STEM,” she said.

    Developed by the Caribbean Science Foundation, SPISE holds its annual session between July and August at UWI’s Barbados campus. In Saint Lucia, the programme has long depended on LUCELEC’s sustained support to open its doors to local emerging talent.

  • Education : Scholarships in Italy, Applications open

    Education : Scholarships in Italy, Applications open

    Opportunities for early-career scholars and professionals from IILA member Latin American countries, including Haiti, are now available, as applications have launched for the 2026 IILA–MAECI/DGCS scholarship program. The announcement was made public by Haiti’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which shared full details of the postgraduate specialization and professional development internship program with interested candidates.

    Organized by the International Italo-Latin American Organization (IILA), the program supports individuals looking to advance their skills and academic credentials across six high-priority, growing fields. These include agri-food science and food technology, sustainable development and renewable energies, life sciences and biotechnology, space science and technology, cultural heritage preservation and management, and contemporary creative practices. Each of these sectors aligns with global development priorities and growing market demand for skilled specialists, giving recipients unique opportunities to build impactful careers.

    To be considered for the scholarship, candidates must meet a clear set of eligibility requirements. All applicants must hold a valid government-issued passport, be under 35 years of age at the time of application, demonstrate basic working knowledge of the Italian language, and hold a completed bachelor’s degree in a field related to their chosen study area.

    The application window will close on September 30, 2026. Interested candidates can access full program guidelines, official registration forms, and additional details about the scholarship terms through the IILA official website at www.iila.org. This initiative represents a ongoing partnership between Italian educational institutions and Latin American member states, designed to foster cross-regional knowledge exchange and professional growth for emerging leaders.

  • Send misbehaving students home

    Send misbehaving students home

    As Trinidad and Tobago prepared to welcome students back for the start of a new academic year on Monday, Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar delivered a sweeping back-to-school address that laid out strict new guidelines for addressing classroom disruption, placing clear accountability on both unruly students and disengaged parents. In her annual pre-term message released a day before classes kicked off, the Prime Minister laid out a clear mandate for school leaders and teaching staff: adopt a zero-tolerance stance toward disrespectful, disruptive behavior from students and confrontational interactions from parents, and remove uncooperative individuals from campus immediately rather than allowing them to derail learning for well-behaved peers.

    Persad-Bissessar opened her remarks by acknowledging the heavy weight of responsibility carried by educators across the country, noting that effective teaching requires a rare combination of patience, authoritative leadership, and critical decision-making. She thanked teachers and principals for upholding academic standards while nurturing the next generation of Trinidad and Tobago citizens, but made clear that their well-being and ability to teach must take priority over accommodating those who refuse to engage constructively. “You are not there to be abused, intimidated, and harassed by any student or parent,” she emphasized. “If students refuse to behave properly and parents are ignoring your concerns, send them straight home and let them and their parents battle it out in their house.”

    For cases involving threats or violent abuse against school staff, Persad-Bissessar instructed educators to contact the Trinidad and Tobago Police Service (TTPS) immediately, handing off disciplinary action to law enforcement for serious incidents. The Prime Minister stressed that teachers should be able to direct their full energy toward supporting and teaching students who come to school ready to learn, rather than expending emotional and professional capital on uncooperative parties.

    Shifting focus to parental responsibilities, Persad-Bissessar pushed back against the common trend of caregivers shifting disciplinary and preparatory duties onto school staff, reminding parents that guiding a child’s behavior is a fundamental family obligation. “Do not dump your parental responsibilities onto teachers. That is your job. You made your children; it is not the teachers’ or anyone else’s responsibility to mind them,” she said. She urged parents to prioritize teaching core values of discipline, respect, and personal responsibility at home, maintain open lines of communication with educators, and actively monitor their children’s academic progress and social behavior. She also issued a stark warning about the long-term consequences of failing to guide children, noting that unaddressed bad behavior in school often leads to legal trouble later in life, leaving aging parents to navigate the justice system to secure bail for incarcerated adult children.

    Addressing students directly, the Prime Minister urged the vast majority of young people to approach the new academic year with intention and focus, emphasizing that a strong education forms the foundation of long-term personal and professional success. She encouraged students to attend class consistently, respect school staff, take ownership of their learning, and embrace the opportunities of school to build friendships and skills that will last a lifetime. But she also called out the small minority of students who come to school to bully peers, disrupt classes, and disengage from learning, warning that these choices set students up for long-term hardship.

    Persad-Bissessara pushed back against popular narratives that frame school failure as a minor setback with no long-term consequences, arguing that claims like “failing at school doesn’t end your life” are disingenuous. She noted that the people who share this glib reassurance with struggling students almost universally stress the importance of education to their own children and grandchildren. “These same persons, while publicly giving you that advice, are privately giving their own children and grandchildren the same warnings about a difficult future without an education as I am giving you today,” she said. She added that these same advocates will not step in to support students who leave school unqualified and struggle to secure stable, well-paying work, warning that life without an education often devolves into daily survival rather than a fulfilling, prosperous life. “There will always be difficult days in life, but a good education gives you many options to navigate difficulty and overcome challenges, to have a wonderful life,” she added.

    In closing, Persad-Bissessar called on all three groups — students, parents, and educators — to make intentional choices that support their own long-term success and contribute to the future prosperity of Trinidad and Tobago. She ended her address with a message of spiritual guidance, saying, “May God guide and protect each of you and may you make the best decisions for a great future for yourself and the nation.”

  • Unsafe for students

    Unsafe for students

    As the new school term kicks off across Trinidad and Tobago on Monday, one regional secondary school finds itself at the center of a growing parent-led standoff over unresolved structural and safety hazards that have been festering for nearly a decade. Fyzabad Anglican Secondary School, a campus serving roughly 600 students and 50 staff members, is set to welcome pupils per the Ministry of Education’s official schedule – but how many families will actually send their children through its doors remains an open question, driven by widespread safety concerns shared by the school’s parent community.

    Allan Phirangee, president of the school’s Parent-Teacher Association (PTA), laid out the scope of the dangerous conditions plaguing the campus in interviews over the weekend. Two prefabricated classroom buildings and the school’s library have already been officially condemned due to structural failure, yet the school’s current plan calls for holding regular classes in adjacent spaces just meters away from the unsafe structures. That arrangement creates immediate danger for students, Phirangee argued, and shifting all classes out of the condemned zones would only create another hazard: extreme overcrowding in the remaining usable campus space that would also fail to meet basic safety standards.

    The PTA’s frustration runs far deeper than a last-minute scheduling issue. Phirangee confirmed that formal requests for major repairs to the condemned structures and other failing infrastructure date all the way back to 2014, with repeated letters sent to the Ministry of Education, Ministry of Public Utilities, the local Member of Parliament, and the Occupational Safety and Health Authority and Agency (OSHA) over the intervening years. While school officials and PTA leaders have pushed for action, the scale of the required reconstruction puts the project firmly under government oversight, leaving parent leaders with no ability to complete the work independently.

    Beyond the condemned buildings, the campus faces a litany of additional hazards that put students and staff at risk. Outdated and failing wiring threatens electrical hazards, change rooms are in a state of disrepair, and a wooden ramp used by a wheelchair-using student has loose, unstable boards that create an immediate accessibility risk. Sewer lines and the campus roof are also in urgent need of replacement. One parent, Seeta Bridgelal, went further to outline ongoing pest issues, reporting that bats, rats, snakes, and feral cats and dogs roam the campus, creating health risks. She also noted that widespread rusted furniture has forced her to repeatedly replace her son’s uniforms after they are torn or damaged on the corroded surfaces.

    Out of frustration with the slow pace of progress, Phirangee confirmed that many parents are considering keeping their children home on opening day to draw public attention to the government’s failure to follow through on promised repairs. Parents have even called for a temporary full relocation of the student body, and have raised questions about a proposed shift system that has been discussed as a temporary solution, with no clear timeline for implementation.

    Phirangee added that approval for the full reconstruction project was granted back in June, with an expectation that all work would be completed during the July-August school vacation to avoid disrupting the new term. That schedule was not met, leaving the school in limbo as term begins.

    Officials with the National Maintenance Training Security Company Ltd (MTS), the firm contracted to complete the repairs, acknowledged the issues during a site visit Sunday. Nicholas Kanhai, interim CEO of MTS, confirmed that Fyzabad Anglican Secondary has been added to both the regular vacation repair roster and the emergency repair program. He outlined that three major projects are now in the pipeline: demolition and full reconstruction of the two prefabricated buildings and the library, emergency repairs to the campus sewer system (which is dealing with a failed pump), and renovations to the dilapidated change rooms. Kanhai explained that the company is still finalizing the procurement process for the large reconstruction project, with contractor awards expected by the end of the month, allowing work to begin shortly after.

    Emergency repairs to the roof and change rooms were scheduled to begin Sunday, Kanhai said, and roof work is expected to continue through the weekend. He stressed that the ongoing repairs will not prevent the school from opening, and that MTS and contracted firms will put all necessary safety precautions in place to protect students while work proceeds during the school week.

    This is not the first school infrastructure controversy to emerge ahead of the new term. Last week, the PTA at Marabella North Secondary School raised similar concerns over unaddressed structural and maintenance failures at their campus. Responding to reporter questions during a tour of another regional school Friday, Education Minister Dr Michael Dowlath reaffirmed that all schools across the country would open on schedule for the new term, noting that while ongoing repairs will continue at multiple campuses, the work will not disrupt the start of classes. Dowlath added that MTS is fully aware of the issues at Fyzabad Anglican Secondary and is actively working to resolve them.