Schools affected by Hurricane Melissa to get cleanup grants

 

The Cabinet has approved the disbursement of relief grants to schools in western parishes which were damaged during the passage of Hurricane Melissa two weeks ago. 

 

Education Minister Senator Dr. Dana Morris Dixon says distribution of the grants will begin on Friday. 

 

The grants will be used to clean up and set up temporary learning spaces. 

 

"The grants will be from $300,000 to $1 million depending on how much cleanup they are doing and so those will start going out to the schools starting tomorrow. So I thank the team at the Ministry, especially our CFO, for making sure that those funds can get to the schools as quickly as possible," she announced.

 

The ministry has pulled on the expertise of external stakeholders and consultants, such as the Jamaica Institute of Engineers and the Jamaica Institute of Quantity Surveyors to assist with assessing the damage to schools. 

 

Dr. Morris Dixon said she is concerned that some schools which are repaired after Hurricane Beryl in July last year are again in the same position. 

 

"So that raises questions for me about the quality of work that would have been done and it also raises other questions about standards and the standards of our schools. And so I've asked some of our multilateral partners to work with us to look at the building standards around schools because it's not acceptable that you have a hurricane one year and you fix it and then the next year you are back at it again. And so we will be doing that work. We have to build schools that are climate resilient," she conceded. 

 

The Ministry of Education has said schools in the western region will begin reopening next Monday. 

 

The Education Minister toured several schools in St. James and Trelawny on Wednesday. 

 

Dr. Morris Dixon, who spoke with the media at Cornwall College in St. James, where cleanup activities were taking place, said the cleanup grants that will be distributed to affected schools are critical to supporting administrators who have been proactive.

 

"Because they're not sitting and waiting on the ministry, and that's what's beautiful. I'm here right now. I'm at Cornwall College and they had their cleanup day and they had parents, they had the students, the community, the past students, everybody came in and the teachers came in to support the cleanup effort. When you go into one of the classroom blocks, I mean, there are no windows, there is no roof. You're looking up at the heavens. It is really, really, really disheartening to see," she lamented. 

 

Dr. Morris Dixon said the schools will prioritise getting students sitting the Caribbean Secondary Education Certificate (CSEC), Caribbean Advanced Proficiency Examination (CAPE) and Primary Exit Profile (PEP) back into the physical environment.

 

Tents and semi-permanent structures will be erected to supplement classroom spaces. 

 

On Thursday, Dr. Morris Dixon said some 665 schools across Jamaica have been reopened.