$14 Billion To End Shift System In Jamaica’s Schools

It will cost the Jamaican government 14 billion dollars to remove schools from the shift system. That is according to the Minister with responsibility for Education, Youth and Information Karl Samuda. His announcement follows the Opposition’s call earlier this year for more attention to be given to ending the system.

” The Permanent Secretary (Dr. Grace Mclean) was just showing me a document where it will require fourteen billion dollars to take all the schools off shift and there is a particular list of schools identified to be removed off that system this year,”  Samuda shared.

Teachers have long been lobbying for the shift system to be removed. In 2008, then Minister of Education, Andrew Holness had announced that the shift system did not benefit the education system and plans were underway to have it removed over a five year period.

Now school administrations have been renewing calls for  the complete end to the double shift system. Their belief is that the full day system would allow for a more relaxed learning environment for students and afford teachers greater opportunities to assess potential learning problems in the classroom.

KHADIJAH THOMAS