Education Ministry: All schools reopen today

THE Ministry of Education is promising that schools which did not reopen last week, will do so today. These include St Augustine Senior Comprehensive, Rose Hill RC, St Crispin’s AC and La Seiva RC schools. In a statement yesterday, the ministry said the opening of the above schools will bring to an end the “most ambitious repair and refurbishment works” undertaken by the ministry during the July/August school vacation period. The ministry added that minor works will continue at some schools on weekends in a manner that would not disrupt the “harmonious operation of the school.”

However Newsday understands that the La Pastora Government Primary School will remain closed until further notice and students of the Brasso Seco RC have returned to the condemned school building. In both cases, the schools were condemned on the basis that it was unsafe for occupation by the children. At La Pastora, structural work was undertaken but the roof has yet to be replaced and parents have been informed that their children must remain home until further notice. At Brasso Seco, president of the North Coast regional community council Owen Charles, told Newsday last week that the ministry had promised to accommodate the children at the nearby community centre.

However he said, refurbishment works at the centre were not completed, and the students returned to the Brasso Seco school building. He said they received no information as to when the centre will be ready or when construction of a new school will begin. The ministry’s statement yesterday said it had originally undertook to repair 159 schools, but 202 primary and secondary schools were instead repaired and refurbished. The works were carried out by 116 contracting firms.