分类： education

As thousands of prospective international higher education students and their families gathered at the Lloyd Erskine Sandiford Centre for Saturday’s 2026 CUP Fest International Education Fair, industry leaders issued a key reminder: intentional financial preparation is non-negotiable for anyone pursuing studies abroad.

Organized by The Student Centre, the College and University Prep (CUP) event was designed to connect secondary school graduates and working professionals with accredited higher education institutions from around the world, helping them map out sustainable paths to overseas learning. This year’s gathering brought 25 international institutions to the venue, with 21 based in Canada and four from other nations. Attendees could explore undergraduate programs spanning arts, science, engineering, medical training and dozens of other disciplines, alongside one-on-one guidance from local financing bodies including the Student Revolving Loan Fund (SRLF) and RBC Royal Bank.

Sheena Alleyne, Managing Director of The Student Centre, told media that far too many prospective students fixate on the prestige and experience of studying at a foreign university without building a clear, diversified plan to cover costs. “You have to have a financial plan. You can’t put all your eggs in one basket, so you have to map out all the funding pipelines available to you,” Alleyne said.

While Alleyne emphasized that scholarships are a valuable resource for offsetting tuition and living expenses, she warned against relying on them as a single source of funding. Instead, she encouraged students to combine multiple funding streams, from institutional and government scholarships to bank loans, the local SRLF, personal savings, and contributions from extended family. “A scholarship is nice… You can have a loan; that’s why we have the banks, and we have the Student Revolving Loan Fund here. You may have your own personal savings, auntie, your uncle, sometimes there’s a whole village to support this journey, so you can piece different options together,” she explained.

Alleyne also noted a key distinction between scholarship types that students often miss: some higher education institutions automatically consider all admitted applicants for merit scholarships, while others require separate, standalone applications to access financial aid. Prospective students must account for these procedural differences to avoid missing out on available funding, she added.

Beyond financial guidance, Alleyne highlighted that the fair serves a far broader purpose: making international education accessible to all groups, not just recent secondary school graduates. “This is one step in the direction of preparing for education after you complete your secondary studies, but it’s not only for our school students; we are also targeting persons, working professionals who might want to upgrade their credentials,” she said. The in-person event also gives applicants a unique chance to connect directly with institutional representatives before diving into deep online research, helping them quickly assess whether their target programs align with both their academic goals and their budget.

Caroline Mourand, Senior Trade Commissioner at the High Commission of Canada in Barbados, echoed the call for thorough pre-application research, noting that Canada remains one of the most popular destinations for Barbadian and Caribbean students seeking overseas degrees. The country’s enduring appeal, she explained, stems from its globally recognized high-quality education system and its well-earned reputation as a safe, welcoming environment for international learners.

“I think that there’s a lot of interest in education in Canada. I’ve had a lot of conversations today, meeting a lot of people that have long-standing education ties with Canada,” Mourand said. This year, Canada is projected to welcome 155,000 new international students across its institutions, and Mourand confirmed that abundant spots remain open for qualified applicants from Barbados and the wider Caribbean.

Mourand encouraged prospective students to leave no question unasked during the research process, covering everything from program curriculum and admission requirements to total tuition costs, off-campus living expenses, campus community culture, and all available scholarship opportunities. “Do not be afraid to ask 1000 questions because it is a very important and big decision that you’re going to make,” she said, adding that students can access up-to-date, verified information on all Canadian higher education programs via the official EduCanada website.

A collaborative capacity-building workshop hosted for the Barbados National Student Council is putting campus safety data directly into the hands of young people, equipping them to turn on-the-ground observations of school infrastructure issues and bullying into actionable policy changes for education authorities. Held Friday, the event brought together roughly 20 student representatives from 12 secondary and primary institutions across the island, marking the first in a new series of partnerships between the Barbados Human Rights Commission, the National Student Council, and the University of the West Indies (UWI) School for Graduate Studies.

Speaking to reporters on site, Human Rights Commissioner Kerry-Ann Ifill explained that the workshop’s core mission is to bridge the gap between raw student-collected data and institutional decision-making. Long before the workshop, hundreds of students across 15 Barbadian schools participated in a nationwide school mapping exercise, where they walked their campuses to identify safe and unsafe spaces, and document the challenges they face daily. Friday’s training walked participating students through the process of cleaning, organizing, and structuring that field data into formal findings that can be shared with school leadership and national education officials.

“Today we are focusing on how data drives decisions,” Ifill said. “These young people already put in the work to conduct on-the-ground research. Now we are showing them how to leverage that information to create the tangible change they want to see in their schools.”

Per early analysis of the student mapping data, the most prevalent concerns raised center on inadequate infrastructure and maintenance issues across campuses. Students reported widespread unsanitary conditions in school bathrooms, marked by heavy graffiti and poor cleaning, as well as a widespread shortage of trash receptacles that contributes to pervasive litter on school grounds. Many classroom desks have also sustained significant damage from termite infestations, leaving learning spaces in disrepair. Beyond infrastructure, students also documented limited food variety in school canteens, and flagged a notable recent rise in bullying incidents that has eroded many students’ sense of personal safety on campus.

National Student Council President Shakir Daisley noted that the mapping exercise was completed several months ago, but student leaders have been working through the raw data to prepare it for distribution. Friday’s workshop is a key step in that finalization process. Once compiled, the full findings will first be shared with local school student councils, then submitted to the Ministry of Education Transformation for review, before being released to the broader public. Daisley emphasized that the project gives students a rare, direct voice in shaping school policy that impacts their daily lives. “I just hope that we all can take the information and then take it back to our schools and then see what we can use to benefit ourselves,” he said.

Leading the workshop’s research training session was Professor Dwayne Devonish, director of the UWI School for Graduate Studies, which is celebrating its 30th anniversary of coordinating graduate-level research and studies across the region this year. Devonish argued that teaching research and data literacy to young people long before they reach tertiary education builds critical thinking skills that benefit communities long into adulthood.

“I have this belief that research should not begin at a university. It should begin as young as the primary and secondary school student populations,” Devonish said. “Because when we can teach our young people to be scientific in their endeavours, to be research-oriented, we can actually develop adults who are critical, who are careful in their assessments, and who are able to create their own knowledge.”

Beyond campus safety, Devonish added that the workshop is intended to build a culture of youth-led research across the Caribbean that can be used to tackle a wide range of pressing regional challenges, from climate change to violent crime. “If we can use research as a tool, we can make a difference. We don’t have to put it on the face of an older person. Research can actually be executed by very young people that we have here,” he said.

Ifill echoed that the project aligns with the Human Rights Commission’s core strategic priorities, which place a heavy focus on education and youth engagement. By embedding data literacy and youth advocacy early, the commission hopes to cultivate a lifelong habit of civic engagement among young Barbadians. “Coming out of this workshop, we hope that they can transform what they took and make it into a report, into data that can help the schools to rearrange how they approach safety in schools,” Ifill said.

At 68 years old, Elviston Maloney is set to make history this Saturday when he walks across the graduation stage at the University of the West Indies (UWI) Cave Hill Campus to collect his combined bachelor’s degree in psychology and management, capping off seven years of determined study. But beyond his personal milestone, this blind disability rights advocate is using his moment in the spotlight to push for critical systemic change: accessible infrastructure and accommodations for disabled students must start in primary school, not be left as an afterthought for tertiary institutions to address.

Maloney’s journey through higher education has shed light on longstanding gaps in Barbados’ education system. When he enrolled in 2019, he was part of a cohort of seven disabled students on campus, including another blind student, a student with hearing impairment, a student with dyslexia, two wheelchair users, and a student who used a walker. Maloney explained that the Cave Hill campus was never designed to accommodate this diverse range of accessibility needs. While he credits the university and its faculty for making sincere efforts to welcome disabled students, he says gaps in access created unnecessary barriers to learning.

One of the most persistent daily challenges Maloney and his fellow blind peers faced was accessing course materials. Even when lecture slides were available for download, converting them to a screen-reader compatible format was a time-consuming, tedious process that added extra burden to already rigorous coursework. “You’re dealing with something like 50 slides, 52 slides, depending on the topic area and the lecturer. So that in itself had its own challenge in terms of accessing the information,” Maloney explained, though he noted most lecturers went out of their way to be accommodating.

Maloney argues that fixing these accessibility gaps at the tertiary level is too little, too late. Instead, he says basic accessible equipment – including computers, printers, and large-print tools – should be standard fixtures in every primary school classroom, not special requests for individual students. Building accessible infrastructure early creates a pipeline that allows disabled students to build skills and confidence before moving on to secondary and then tertiary education. Without this early foundation, Maloney says disabled students arrive at university already facing overwhelming barriers that even the most well-meaning institutions struggle to address.

“The challenge can be that if nothing happens at the primary and secondary levels, but then you suddenly find yourself into a tertiary institution, which is not prepared for you, which knows very little about how to accommodate you, in the true sense of the word. They too are going to struggle,” he said.

Beyond infrastructure, Maloney also called for reform of how disability education policies are created. He criticized the common practice of designing policies for disabled people without including disabled people in the decision-making process. Most policies are drafted at upper levels of government bureaucracy, he said, and the few disabled advocates who are invited to the table often lack the grassroots connection to represent ordinary disabled people, who frequently do not have the financial or family support to participate in high-level policy discussions.

Financial barriers also persist beyond primary school. Maloney noted that scholarships earmarked for disabled students are extremely limited and often come with age restrictions, forcing older disabled students like himself to fund their education independently. This barrier has already put his planned master’s degree on hold, he said.

Kerry-Ann Ifill, a blind Human Rights Commissioner, echoed Maloney’s calls for change, noting that the country’s current draft inclusive education policy signals a coming shift toward integrating disabled students into mainstream schooling, rather than segregating them. But she also acknowledged that achieving this goal will require sustained effort, increased public education, and systemic investment to make it a reality.

For Maloney, the core of the issue is changing public perception. “It really takes very little for a person to acquire a disability. Absolutely very little. A sickness, a fall, things like that. And your whole life can change without even thinking about it,” he said. “If people can only begin to recognise that disability does not mean inability.”

UWI Cave Hill Student Services Manager Dr. Khaleid Holder acknowledged that accessibility needs vary widely between individuals, and the university tailors accommodations to each student’s specific requirements. For Maloney, this included adjusting physical and virtual learning spaces to work with his screen reader software. Holder stressed that accessibility is a core strategic priority for the university, and the institution works hard to meet the needs of all enrolled disabled students. He also agreed with Maloney that improving accessibility needs to start early in the education pipeline, rather than waiting until students reach university, and said the university’s ultimate goal is to create an environment where students of all abilities can thrive.

For other disabled people considering pursuing a university degree, Maloney says systemic change is important, but personal grit matters too. “You have to have a desire in your mind to overcome the hurdles and move to the next level,” he said.