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Minister of Education and Human Resource Development, Ronald Jones, (right) and Principal of Hillaby Turners Hall Primary, Karen Best, looking at the prefab building recently erected at the school.????

Minister of Education and Human Resource Development, Ronald Jones, has given the all clear for a smooth start to the new school year, which is for just over a week away on Monday, September 6.

He made this declaration recently while touring five primary schools to inspect works which had been done over the summer holidays.?? According to him, 22 schools were targeted for upgrades or the construction of pre-fabricated buildings, which were undertaken at the cost of some 1.1 million dollars.

Eden Lodge Nursery School received one of the major upgrades in an effort to make that school ready to receive the school meals service provided by the Ministry. Mr. Jones explained that a room had been converted into a serving area so that the 96 children enrolled there could get hot lunches like their counterparts in other primary schools.??

In this same vein, the Minister said Government was also considering requests from some private schools to be provided with from the school meals service.?? "We have some requests from private schools and that is under consideration.?? All of our children are Barbadians, and right now we do cover some private schools based on request, but we have now been having a little more requests during this particularly difficult economic time and we will look into how we can, in the short term satisfy some of those requests," he explained.

Other improvements which were pointed out during the tour were: the covering of stairs and installation of windows to replace breeze blocks at Deacon’s Primary School; external painting and repairs to doors at St. Stephen’s Primary; Repairs to the ceiling and painting at Sharon Primary and the erection and repair of a two classroom prefab building at Hillaby Turner’s Hall.

Primary schools at which repairs have been done or are past the 90 per cent stage of completion are: Chalky Mount in St. Andrew, St. Bartholomew’s, Christ Church, St. Luke’s in St. George, St. Margaret’s in St. John, St. Mary’s in St. Michael, St. Stephen’s Nursery in St. Michael, All Saints in St. Peter, Selah in St. Lucy, Holy Innocent’s in St. Thomas and Good Shepherd in St. James.?? The remaining schools should be ready by the end of this week. kmoore@barbados.gov.bb

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