The Tribune

By DENISE MAYCOCK


Tribune Freeport Reporter

dmaycock@tribunemedia.net

THE Davis administration is moving to expand special education capacity in Grand Bahama after officials found more than 50 children waiting for placement at the island’s Beacon School, with two schools now being refurbished to accommodate additional special education units.

Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Education Chester Cooper said Bartlett Hill Primary and the new Holmes Rock Junior High School are being prepared to provide additional space for students with special needs, as the Ministry of Education confronts what he described as a potentially much larger national demand for assessments and services.

Mr Cooper said potentially thousands of students across The Bahamas are awaiting assessments after referrals by teachers and principals, making special education an urgent priority for the ministry.

He said the scale of the problem in Grand Bahama became clear during a recent visit to the Beacon School.

“One of the things I learned was that the waiting list was roughly 53 persons,” he said.

Mr Cooper said the administration decided additional capacity was needed to ensure students with special needs have access to appropriate education.

“It's about inclusion, it's about dignity, it's about ensuring that every child has an opportunity to improve their lot in life, contribute to society, and live their best life possible,” he said.

On Monday, Mr Cooper toured several Grand Bahama schools, including Bartlett Hill Primary, Holmes Rock Junior High, Jack Hayward High School in Freeport and McLean’s Town Primary in East Grand Bahama, to assess repairs and preparations ahead of the September reopening.

The new Holmes Rock Junior High School includes an elevator and ramps to accommodate students with disabilities, features Mr Cooper said will become particularly important as special education units are introduced there.

“We are ensuring inclusion and we will consistently work within the means of our available resources to ensure that we consistently upgrade the facilities to accommodate elevators etc and tools and ramps etc to focus on cater to children who may be disabled,” he said.

The ministry is also planning a special education diploma pathway for students alongside vocational education opportunities.

Mr Cooper said the administration is seeking to expand the number of teachers and specialists able to work with students with special needs, including speech pathologists and professionals trained in applied behaviour analysis.

The University of The Bahamas has been asked to partner with the ministry to train at least 75 teachers in special education.

Mr Cooper said the ministry also has an existing memorandum of understanding with Barry University and is pursuing a partnership with Florida Memorial University as part of efforts to increase the number of trained Bahamian special education teachers.

The expansion comes as the ministry undertakes a broader recruitment drive aimed at hiring as many as 300 teachers ahead of the new school year.

Mr Cooper said the recruits will not all come from Ghana, with the ministry seeking teachers from Nigeria, Ghana, the Philippines, the United States, the United Kingdom and Caribbean countries.

He stressed, however, that Bahamians remain the priority.

“We are seeking to recruit as many Bahamians as we possibly can,” he said.

The ministry is targeting recent University of The Bahamas graduates, retired teachers and others through its teacher reserve and supply-teacher programmes.

Mr Cooper said about 100 Bahamian teachers have already been enlisted to enter classrooms in September.

Foreign applicants are undergoing background checks and credential verification, including police and Interpol vetting and accreditation checks to ensure their qualifications meet Bahamian requirements.

“This is a work in progress,” Mr Cooper said. “We are going to be ready for a school to open in September, but we're going to consistently work to ensure that we bridge the gap that we are confronted with.”

Special education will be among the areas targeted in the recruitment exercise.

Mr Cooper also said the administration remains concerned about the safety of students, teachers and parents on school campuses.

He credited the Royal Bahamas Police Force’s school resource officer programme with helping to reduce violence at schools over the past several years and said the ministry would continue working with police to prevent and respond to incidents.

“We would like to think that we have a zero-tolerance for school violence,” he said.