The Tribune

By RASHAD ROLLE

Tribune Staff Reporter

rrolle@tribunemedia.net

THE Ministry of Education is still determining if the more than 20,000 text books donated to the Urban Renewal Commission meet the curriculum needs of Bahamian students.

Director of Education Lionel Sands told The Tribune yesterday that curriculum officers have already begun the process of assessing the usefulness of the text books, which were donated by schools in Broward Country, Ft Lauderdale, earlier this week.

He said he could not say how long the process of assessing the books will take because “there are a lot of books”.

It is unclear what will happen to the text books if they fail to meet curriculum needs.

The books cover a wide range of topics, including mathematics, English, history, auto mechanics, engineering and journalism.

The Florida schools that donated the books no longer require them because they are moving toward computerising their system, according to Urban Renewal 2.0 co-chair Cynthia “Mother” Pratt.

In receiving the books on Monday, Mrs Pratt said: “These books are very expensive, from math to science to English to history, everything is here. We are so grateful that we didn’t have to pay for this. This is millions of dollars that have been donated to the Bahamian people. We are grateful. We will now donate the books to education, to the community, to churches, to centres.”

Vice-president of fiscal affairs and administration at Atlanta College, Melanie Thompson, was on hand for the donation presentation and expressed interest in obtaining the books on behalf of her institution.

She said: “The books will go a long way to helping the 35 students enrolled in our GED (general educational development) programme.

“These are very necessary because as a GED programme we have to take some of our students a little bit back from grade 12, so some students we had to take them back from grade 6, grade 7, so the material that’s here is wonderful, and is so needed and timely.”

People from the community are still invited to collect the books for free from Mable Walker Primary School today and tomorrow.