By Fernando Davis

Minister of Education, Youth and Information Fayval Williams says the partnership between the public and private sector has greatly enhanced the Government’s Tablets in Schools Programme, bringing closer the reality of digitally empowering students islandwide.

Speaking during a handover ceremony of tablet computers to students at the Hopewell Primary School in Watchwell, St. Elizabeth, Williams added that while the main objective has always been to provide needy students with the tools to facilitate online learning, the tablets will still be useful to them “even during the post-COVID era”.

“We want to thank all our private sector partners for their support in this most worthy of initiatives. We also want to give a special shout out to the Seprod Foundation and also the American Friends of Jamaica for their assistance in providing tablets for our students… a great investment and one that will help them to manage themselves better in the online world,” said Williams.

She said the interest being shown by a number of local companies, including members of the Diaspora, cannot be overstated, adding that the gesture is good and beneficial for the nation’s children in their quest for knowledge and also in preparing for the long road ahead.

The minister, in the meantime, also made clear that the Tablets in School initiative was well under way before the raging COVID-19 pandemic landed on Jamaican shores, “but has however forced us to accelerate the programme”.

She added that the entire world is embarking on a digital highway and that the Government recognises that for Jamaica to remain competitive, “we have to ensure that our citizens are literate and can manage themselves in the online world”.

 Williams added: “Our teachers must also be commended for taking the time to successfully complete their training so as to have a better grasp of the technology so that they could create these virtual classrooms for the students.”

For his part, Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries Floyd Green said the tablets would greatly enhance the learning experience of the students of Hopewell Primary and couldn’t have come at a better time.

 Green, who is also the member of parliament for South West St. Elizabeth, added that: “I am particularly happy for those parents who would not have been able to afford the devices. Education is an important investment… the best investment a parent can make in the lives of their children.”

SEPROD PROUD TO DONATE DEVICES

In the meantime, Lisa D’Oyen, executive director of the Seprod Foundation, said that, in conjunction with the American Friends of Jamaica (AFJ), her company was proud to donate devices in support of the Ministry of Education, Youth and Information’s ‘A Device for Every Child – Bridging the Digital Divide’ initiative.

“We successfully distributed 200 tablets between October and November of last year, and we are embarking on a distribution of an additional 320 tablets across 10 schools this month,” she said.

“Our programme, the ConnectEd JA Fund, would therefore have provided a total of 520 tablets to 520 students across 15 primary schools islandwide. We believe that getting a device to every child will go far beyond getting our students through the pandemic, but will provide them with the tools needed to continue to engage with technology and learn important skills such as coding which will be relevant to any subject area, and career path they choose to pursue.”