Slowley: Schools sabotaging prospects of students by withholding CSEC results

MEMBER OF Parliament for St Elizabeth North Eastern Delroy Slowley has called on the Ministry of Education and Youth to clamp down on the practice by some schools of withholding the Caribbean Secondary Education Certificate (CSEC) results of students until auxiliary fees are paid in full.

In his contribution to the State of the Constituency Debate in Gordon House yesterday, Slowley rebuked the school administrators who continue to withhold CSEC results.

The Government MP said he had to find $1 million from the Constituency Development Fund (CDF) to offset outstanding auxiliary fees for nearly 100 students in his constituency.

“These students would have been otherwise disenfranchised from accessing further career and educational prospects. I think this is an unconscionable act, especially when education is a platform for the betterment of this country,” Slowley charged.

He contended that by withholding the students’ CSEC results, the schools were punishing and sabotaging the prospects of the young people whose families were already struggling to send them to school.

“I am calling on the necessary authorities to put an immediate stop to this practice and find alternative means,” he said.

Early childhood education

Turning to early childhood education, Slowley said that construction has been completed on both the new Santa Cruz Primary and Infant department and the Leeds Primary and Infant department at a combined cost of more than $80 million.

He said work would also start on the Roses Valley Primary School in Balaclava at a cost of $47.9 million. Construction is expected to be completed by the end of March 2024, Slowley said.

Meanwhile, as the two main political parties crank up their political machinery in preparation for Local Government Elections, which are due to be held by the end of February 2024, some MPs use campaign rhetoric as they make their State of the Constituency Debate presentations.

St Elizabeth South Eastern Member of Parliament Franklyn Witter, who made his contribution to the debate yesterday, predicted that he would double his margin of victory at the national polls when elections are called.

He boasted that Junction in St Elizabeth was the fastest-growing town in the country.

Witter told his parliamentary colleagues that he used 60 per cent of the allocation from his CDF to carry out road repairs in his constituency. He said with the support of his councillors and help from the ministers with responsibility for works and local government, the roads in his constituency have been maintained “in fairly good condition”.

He reported that the Systematic Land Titling Project has delivered 1,000 titles to landowners in his constituency.

“This is what we call prosperity,” he said.

The Government MP declared that the people of St Elizabeth South East were satisfied with the performance of the Andrew Holness administration.

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