Director of Regional Educational Services in the Ministry of Education, Skills, Youth and Information for Region One, Ottis Brown. (JIS Photo)
KINGSTON, Jamaica—Schools across Kingston and St Andrew reopened smoothly on Monday, following adjustments to the 2025/26 academic calendar to accommodate the September 3 general election.
“The full resumption of schools in Region One got off to a good start,” said director of regional educational services in the Ministry of Education, Skills, Youth and Information for region one, Ottis Brown.
“The vast majority of them, well over 90 per cent, had children coming in for orientation since last week Monday, and this morning, all our schools were opened to receive our children.”
Region One comprises approximately 162 educational institutions, including 101 primary schools, 45 high schools, and 16 standalone infant schools.
“The region went above and beyond to work with our schools to make certain there would be nothing to prevent an institution from reopening comfortably this morning to receive our children; in fact, comfortably from last week Monday, to receive our children for teaching and learning,” Brown said.
He noted that infrastructural concerns brought to the region’s attention were either fully resolved or sufficiently mitigated, ensuring they did not hinder the reopening of schools.
Meanwhile, Brown advised that the distribution of textbooks to schools has commenced.
“That will continue over the course of September until all the schools that made requests for textbooks have them, so the children can benefit from these critical resources,” he indicated.
The director took the opportunity to remind students and parents that select textbooks are available free of charge in electronic format.
“The language books used by the children from grades seven to 11 are accessible in e-format. Where they need support to download books because of internet per se or other assistance, they can seek help from their schools, because the schools know what to do to have the parents and the children access these books,” Brown said, adding that integrated science books for grades seven to nine are also available.
—JIS