Education Ministry to undertake legislative review amid dispute at St James High
Published:Wednesday | February 26, 2025 | 5:00 PM
Minister of Education, Dr Dana Morris Dixon, said the Ministry plans to review relevant legislation and regulations to give it more power to address internal conflicts at schools.
Speaking at this morning’s post-Cabinet press briefing, Morris Dixon described as disappointing the recent incident at St James High School, which saw its principal, Joseph Williams, and chairman, Christopher McCurdy, embroiled in a heated argument in the school’s parking lot.
The altercation is the culmination of a longstanding, bitter relationship between the school’s principal and chairman and resulted in the school being suspended on Tuesday.
“What happened this week was very, very disappointing, and our students are our priority. For us as a government, the education of our students is number one, and when you have your students not able to go to school because of the internal politics in a school, it is a problem, and we’re going to have to fix it,” she said.
“We feel that we have to look at the legislation; we also have to look at the regulations. I know I was on the education transformation commission, and from then, we had said the law and the regulations don’t give enough power for stepping in, and that is something that we’re going to have to address because what happened is unacceptable,” she added.
Meanwhile, Merris Murray, Executive Director at the National Council on Education, said meetings were held with board members and staff at St James High yesterday to better understand the concerns of stakeholders.
“And there are lots of issues at St James High. There are interpersonal issues, there are issues regarding how they manage conflicts – that is another area where we need specific intervention. We also understand that there was a breakdown in governance in terms of how the board adjudicated matters,” she said.
— Sashana Small
Follow The Gleaner on X, formerly Twitter, and Instagram @JamaicaGleaner and on Facebook @GleanerJamaica. Send us a message on WhatsApp at 1-876-499-0169 or email us at onlinefeedback@gleanerjm.com or editors@gleanerjm.com.