The Tribune

By SANCHESKA BROWN

Tribune Staff Reporter

sbrown@tribunemedia.net

PUBLIC schools throughout the country will open this week instead of next week, Ministry of Education officials announced yesterday.

In a statement, the ministry said because the threat of Tropical Storm Erika has passed and the Bahamas was spared any damage, public schools will open this week as originally scheduled.

Last week, Education Minister Jerome Fitzgerald announced the opening of public schools would be delayed by a week due to the threat of Tropical Storm Erika and the fact that some school repairs were continuing.

In the statement yesterday, however, the ministry said all administrators, teachers and custodial staff should report for duty today.

Students in pre-school, primary school and special needs classes should report to school on Wednesday, September 2 along with 7th and 10th graders attending junior and senior high for the first time.

Students in the 8th and 11th grades should report to school on Thursday, September 3, and all 9th and 12th graders should attend classes on Friday, September 4.

“The Ministry of Education, Science and Technology wishes to inform the public that after consultation with the Meteorological Department we have been advised that the worst of Tropical Storm Erika has passed. Please note that changes have been made to the dates issued last week as we were pro-actively preparing for the possibility of Erika reaching our shores,” the statement said.

“We wish to thank all educators, students, parents and the general public for their cooperation during this time and we assure you that we will always act in the best interest of all concerned parties.”

On Thursday, Mr Fitzgerald said most schools were ready to be opened. He said government spent $7,673,851.92 on the public school repair programme. He also said 300 contracts were awarded throughout the Bahamas for the repairs.

E P Roberts Primary School in New Providence, he said, required the most repairs, which are still underway. However, he said, he has been advised that repairs should be done in time for the opening of school.

Students at A F Adderley have had to be relocated because some of their facilities have been “condemned.” Mr Fitzgerald said the government had to relocate the school’s 7th grade students because the school’s trailers, which had been set up as makeshift classrooms, are not fit for use. He said the government is currently constructing a 24-classroom block costing $10m-$11m.

Until that time, he said the students have been – since before the closure of the last school term – relocated to the Worker’s House building on Tonique Williams-Darling Highway.

Additionally, Mr Fitzgerald said, the nine students attending the Rum Cay All Age School in Rum Cay would be relocated and housed at one of the local churches until the completion of $500,000 worth of renovations to their school.

Both schools, he said, required work that “extends beyond the opening of school”.

Yesterday, the College of the Bahamas also released a statement saying that its Oakes Field Campus and Grosvenor Close Campus remain closed until September 1. However, the college’s Chapter One Bookstore will reopen for normal operations today.

All staff members of campus security, the Information Technology Office and the Physical Plant Department are asked to report for work as assigned.

COB’s Northern Campus in East Grand Bahama will reopen on September 1.