OCHO RIOS, St. Ann:
STUDENTS AND teachers at Three Hills Primary School, as well as Retreat Primary and Junior High School in St. Mary, are expected to receive educational assistance from the Florida-based Global Education for the 21st Century Project (GE21C).
GE21C is a programme for infusing global perspectives into the curriculum, while improving each school in the project overall. A group of representatives from the organisation were in Jamaica recently and conducted assessments of the two schools.
A number of needs were identified and it is expected that by October, this year, those schools will begin to receive assistance in the form of equipment and technical service training.
The project is a joint initiative of executive president of SuperClubs, Joe Issa, and executive director of GE21C, Dr. Beverley DeMott, and is sponsored locally by SuperClubs Resorts.
Michael Pierce, who headed the delegation to Jamaica, recently, said that based on assessments done at the two St. Mary schools, Dr. DeMott and her team will be meeting to decide on the amount of assistance they will be able to afford to give and the amount of teachers from Florida who will be able to participate in the project.
Mr. Pierce said teachers from Florida will act as substitute teachers and run the classrooms, while the local teachers are engaged in in-service training.
He said SuperClubs, as a partner, have provided the tertiary facilities and accommodation for trainers, substitute teachers and other personnel and has been fully supportive of the programme.
Mr. Pierce said the project, scheduled to take place at both schools between October and November, this year, will be the third to be conducted by GE21C in partnership with SuperClubs. The first two were conducted at the Sheffield All-Age School in Westmoreland.
Members of the group who went on tour of the schools recently were Mr. Pierce and his wife Karen, who is a nurse; social worker Erin D'Avanzo; junior high school teacher, Lauren Mackey, and kindergarten and music teacher, Kelle Pierce. Michael Pierce is Professor at Flagler College in Tallahassee, Florida.
