Just weeks before the start of the new academic year, Education Minister Fayval Williams has announced that the public education system is set to receive a boost with some 88 newly minted teachers who were a part of the Ministry of Education and Youth Scholarship Programme expected to enter the teaching force come September.

The education minister made this disclosure during a post-cabinet press briefing on Wednesday (August 16).

“Under the ministry’s special scholarship programme, 88 student teachers are expected to graduate from teacher training institutions to enter into the teaching profession. These new teachers will be bonded for a period of five years and include 40 teachers of mathematics, 16 teachers of physics and chemistry. We recommend that our schools or boards contact the various teacher’s colleges in order to gain access to these special scholarship students,” Williams said.

The education minister also noted that another 10 new graduate teachers of mathematics and science are expected to enter the teaching force through the Build Out Our Science Teachers (BOOST) programme.

“We also have an arrangement with UWI [University of the West Indies] and that programme is called Build Out Our Science Teachers programme or BOOST. Ten new graduates specialising in mathematics and science will enter our system and these would be available,” she said.

In an effort to tackle the current teacher shortage, Williams also urged the relocation of teachers from overstaffed schools to institutions that are currently understaffed.

“We are encouraging voluntary relocation of teachers in overstaffed schools, I know that our current regulation has some restrictions on teachers transferring from school to school, however, there is a facility in place if you voluntarily relocate from a school that has plenty to a school that understaffed, you will be able to do so without having to lose any of your benefits, you do not have to resign from one to take up a position in another.”

– Fayval Williams, Minister of Education.

The education minister further disclosed that the ministry has recruited 68 Cuban teachers to teach in the government teaching service in accordance with the cooperation agreement between the government of Jamaica and Cuba.

“These teachers will be employed to teach Spanish, chemistry, mathematics and physics and again the number of 68 is higher than we have had in the past,” she said.

Notably, minister Williams said that some 1,123 specialist teachers have recently completed their programmes of study and are set to enter the teaching sector come September.